Gardening: Fall 2012

Most of my fall garden is in.

I know it doesn't look like much right now, but I'm so excited about it because we actually prepared for it like all the magazines tell you to (but we never usually do).  Pat hauled in loads of composted calf bedding that I made my raised beds from.  (Black gold! Hey-oh!)  We also "sheet mulched" the pathways, i.e.: laid down cardboard and then mulched on top to prevent weeds.  We also sheet mulched an adjacent area to prepare for spring planting.  Then we added the irrigation system (reconfigured from our spring garden).  I feel so with it!  (That's unusual these days.)

I planted lots of greens: Kale, Mustard and Turnips.  Irrigation action shot below (ha ha!)

There's also a row of carrots and a half-row of garlic.  I wanted to plant shallots but all I have are seeds (and from what I've read on the internet, seeds are best planted indoors in January-ish around these parts).  Waiting patiently.

Resolution: Garden

Happily, my hopes of having a garden this year are coming true.  When I posted about my plans and resolutions, I thought the garden was going to be a pipe-dream, but thankfully I was wrong.

I'll give you a short but happy little tour...

We planted red-skinned potatoes.  (These were planted chunks of potatoes I bought from the store that started to sprout!)  One afternoon in May Clara helped me harvest them.

Of course she tried eating them right away.

Potatoes are such a low-maintenance, high reward crop.  Highly recommended.

"Look at this one!"

For the first time ever, we planted corn.  Clara LOVES corn.  Pat planted a few varieties.  One was Gram's faithful hybrid: G90.  The others were heirloom varieties.

 

 

The two ears Clara's holding are the "Yellow Dent" heirloom variety.  They were the tallest plants too.

When it was time to harvest, (end of May/early June) the G90 tasted 10x better hands down.  Disappointing to me to say the least, as I was really excited about my heirlooms.  The heirloom varieties will keep you alive, but that's about all.  We will be planting G90 next year for sure.

I started four different kinds of heirloom tomatoes from seed.  Below is a picture of one of the tomatoes.  We have them growing on a vertical metal trellis instead of a cage.  (I read an article in organic gardening mag that recommended doing it this way, so we're giving it a try.) 

All of the heirlooms have their own little problems, although the cherry variety is probably the least problem-prone.  (Clara picking the "tiny ones!" below.)

 

She always tries to be good helper!

 

 

 

I also have a row of Zinnias.  These are fun because there is nothing more luxurious than cut flowers in your home. Since they're not in front of the house, I don't care if I cut them all off and bring them in the house!  I plan on planting more summertime flowers as part of the garden next year too.  I'm more and more interested in flower arranging it seems.

Grocery shopping during the summer is really strange.  I almost completely bypass the veggies.  I don't need to buy any!  People must think my family lives on bread, crackers, and cereal though!  Ha, ha!

There's beans and peppers and eggplant to show you too, but I guess that's a post for another day...