2012 - How Does Your Garden Grow?

[Watchman]

New year, new garden.

Get those seed catalogs and start drooling over the lush, green growing things. Begin now in this category to tell of your preparations, successes, and not-so-successes. Will this be the last year we can grow things?

Please stay on the subject of YOUR garden and don't use this as a place to rant. This is a diary of OUR efforts to grow food. It is a given, even in the worst circumstances, that we will garden ANYWAY.

[Watchman]

To begin, here is an article from Mother Earth News about the top seed companies:

http://www.motherearthnews.com/organic- ... 1zsto.aspx

[Toepopper]

One week ago I picked the last handfull of red raspberries and they were the last living thing growing in my garden. Now the leaves have fallen from the fruit trees and the cold weather has set in to stay for a while. I have taken down all the support wires and tomato stakes and yanked out what dead plants I could, tossed them onto the compost heap and closed the book on this years garden. We had a bumper crop of everything we grew this last summer and canned, froze and dehydrated all that we could to keep us in veggies through the winter. Next season we will have to reconfigure a few plots and move things around a bit for more sunlight and better efficiency and I plan on putting up more fence and planting more fruit and nut trees like a Japanese elephant heart plum tree and a couple walnut trees. Today I raked up piles of fallen leaves and will spread these over the growing beds and turn them into the soil. Also have enough leaves to put in my 4' x 6' tall fence-wire container so they can break down into top soil over the winter. This is great natural fertilizer to put in your garden and the price is right too.

[SS5R]

I planted about 50 garlic before the ground froze and covered it with pine shavings and chicken manure from the coop for next spring. I have let the chickens into the garden to have anything that is left, which isn’t much. All water lines are cleared out, hoses put away and any exposed pipes have been insulated. The herb garden has been cut back cleaned out and cover for the winter.

[Toepopper]

It has finally stopped raining so I ran up the hill to my garden and planted a bare root red delicious tree to replace the one that had died. Semi dwarf trees seem to be harder to get established for some reason so I am trying again. After planting this tree I walked around and examined my other fruit trees and noticed they all had buds on them. The cherry trees had the largest buds. This happens every year, it warms up to 50 degrees and the trees think its spring in January and next week it will be snowing. When it gets cold the buds stop growing until it warms up again. This does not seem to harm the trees.

[side_job]

I placed my seed order today, and as I have for many years I order from
www.heirloomseeds.com
they are a small family owned company that networks heirloom growers from around the country. I have always had good germination, and from year to year have saved many seeds of my own. The past year or two those supplies have decreased, so I'm restocking this year.

[Toepopper]

Have looked at these seed companies you have posted and I like what they say, will give them a try this year.
Here is another one in Illinois www.HeirloomSolutions.com

[Toepopper]

It has warmed up to the mid fifties with a clear blue sky so I have been turning over my raised beds and mixing in wood ash from the stove. All of the fruit trees have buds on them and the raspberries are starting to leaf out already. We have also noticed a flock of robins that flew into the area a couple days ago and thats a sure sign of spring. Time to get busy and fix the hole in the fence where a fox has been getting under it and dining on the compost pile.

[bbj101]

Plant your plants in the ground, work the nutrients in your soil.
Then wet newspapers, put layers around the plants overlapping as you go, cover with mulch, and forget about weeds.
Weeds will get through some gardening plastic they will not get through wet newspapers.

[acet7]

It’s been two years and I finally have some tomatoes growing, going to pick my first one tomorrow. I had failed for the last two years they just didn’t germinate or last year they all just split their skins. I planted in what I thought was the winter this year although I don’t think I turned on the heat this year. I have a ton of flat leaf parsley and basil. I also have two new been stalks growing. And I also am trying some garlic. Saw how to do it on youtube and thought I would give it a shot. I’m using an earth box to grow them.

[Toepopper]

OK, I have got to know, did you plant these tomato's in the ground outdoors or are they indoor in a container? I am seriously jealous, its way too early to plant here. What exactly is an earth box? Is this like a cold frame, in the ground covered unit?

[acet7]

I planted them all from seeds (it took too long to grow I think) back in Sept. It is just outside my back door. Here is a link for the earth box http://www.earthbox.com/. My It’s a box that just sits on the ground and I have it raise 4" w/ two 4x4 pressure treated left over lumber so I can see the over flow valve better when I fill it. My neighbor has had lost of luck w/ his, I’m still learning. It's been really hot here, right now it's 84 deg w/ 62% humidity.

[Toepopper]

Pretty slick unit. I have had tomato's that cracked open when it rained on them. Grapes will do the same thing. Here, it usually never rains in the summer months so we don't have the cracked skin scenario to deal with. The problem here is we can't get them in the ground until June because the rain rots the roots . Its been raining for almost a month solid now and is forcast to rain all next week too so its shaping up to be another late planting year. We still have some dehydrated and canned tomato's from last season and are pacing ourselves to make them last till the fresh tomato's can be picked.

[Watchman]

Been biting my nails the last few days. Our apricot tree came into full bloom Sunday, I mean, full, and we anticipated a bumper crop of these delicious fruit - and then we got word Sunday that it would dip below freezing again. It went down to 31 on Monday and 28 on Tuesday and it didn't seem to affect the tree at all. At least the ground wasn't littered with blossoms. Hopefully we are over the crisis.

[Toepopper]

Yep, I hear you. We are sweating bullets over the same scenario and having record breaking cold night time temps and its snowing here right now. My cherry, pear and plums are all in blossom so I hope this cold snap dosen't kill the blossoms. My apricot trees are of the late blooming type called "Puget Gold" which are known to tolerate wet cold spring weather so they should be alright. Once again we see warmer than usual temperatures in the east but colder than normal in the west.

[Toepopper]

It has finally stopped raining and there is a strange bright object in the sky, could it be the sun? Sure felt good. I planted cauliflower, lettuce, broccoli, cabbage and snow peas in the ground and they are doing well. Will start turning the soil for the other crops tomorrow in the morning while its still cool. Right now its 83 in the shade, went from winter to summer in one day.

[SS5R]

Same here, 85 yesterday. I planted Fava beans, 3 verities of Lettuce, Spinach, Kale, Endive, Onions, Cilantro, Shallots, 2 verities of Carrots, Green beans, and some Lupine beans I picked up. Last week I started some peppers and some tomatoes in a small green house.

[Toepopper]

This year I managed to finish the digging on the hillside and created several new flat spots to build raised beds on. Also have some nice flat footpaths to walk on without twisting an ankle while working in the garden. I also completed a railroad tie retainer wall and filled it with earth to plant in. This years garden is 25% larger than last years.
I have planted tomato's, potato's, peas, cucumbers, cauliflower, brocoli, popping corn, yellow peppers, eggplant, cherry tomato's, Virginia peanuts, lettuce, cabbage, green beans, cantalope and honeydew mellons, Himrod grapes, black satin raspberries and had to replace 2 pear trees and one apple that had died. I have one raised bed left to plant and will put carrots and radishes in it. We got a break in the weather so I have planted 3 weeks earlier than last year so hopefully we will be eating the good stuff in July.

[Watchman]

Here in the dry, desert state of Northwestern Wyoming, we had snow two days ago. Because we are out on the road so much our garden will have the BARE minimum of both work and plants.

[SS5R]

We had snow at the same time but not much. Of coarse I had just planted my tomatoes the week before. Walls of water around the tomatoes and covered with towels saved them, everything else got cover with tarps. Everything survived, this happens every year at least once.

[acet7]

Well I was able to get about 20 tomatoes from my earth box this year. They were really small though only about 2” in diameter, I guess I needed better fertilizer. The rest got eating by some caterpillars and the squirrels took the rest. So not all I have is some basil and rosemary. I’m going to try some hot peppers as I think they can take the heat.

[Watchman]

Lordy, Lordy, Lordy - I'm over 40 - and it shows. The growing season in Wyoming is just underway and because we have limited time, we planted a meager garden. A box-bed with 6 tomato plants, garden with a pound and a half of onion sets, 7 pounds of Yukon Gold seed potatoes, 6 hills of straight yellow squash, 6 hills of zucchini, 9 hills of Armenian cucumbers, six hills of spaghetti squash, and a bed of lettuce, mesculin, radishes, beets, and turnips. It appears that our apricot tree is going to have a very large crop this year so we will be canning or drying them. I am so darned thankful that we have a well!

[Toepopper]

That garden dosen't sound meager and you should get a good return on your investment of labor.
I have a new pest this year, a tiny black bug is munching holes through the leaves of my tomato plants. They are so small I can't even see them without wearing my reading glasses. I picked them off by hand but they are back again so today I will spray them with Murphy's Oil Soap and water to discourage them from doing any more damage. Everything else is doing fine considering how cool the weather has been.

[Watchman]

I hate to admit this but our apricot tree had tens of thousands of fruit and because of our work schedule, most of it will end up in the compost pile.

On a brighter note, our nephew gave us four large bags of Nanking Cherries (also known as sand cherries or bush cherries). Wife made 50+ half-pints of jam.

[Watchman]

Our squash (naturally) and cucumbers are thriving.