Harvest Monday July 19th 2010

This post is part of Harvest Mondays at Daphne's Dandelions.  Head on over and check out all the wonderful harvests posted there.

There is lots of harvesting going on here.  I didn't take pictures of all that I harvested, but you will certainly get a good view of what is going on.  The heat continues here in New England with yet another heat wave this past weekend.  So far most things are holding up. 

There have been lots of green beans.  These are Blue Lake bush beans.  They have always been big producers for me.  I have a 4x6 patch planted and am harvesting about 3 quarts of beans every other day. 

Cucumbers are also really coming in these days.  They are mostly being eaten up in salads, but I can foresee pickles in my future.  Peppers are earlier than they ever have been.  I didn't get a picture of all the jalapenos that I've been harvesting as well.  In the picture are bells and Anaheim.

My onion harvest has been less than stellar.  I've never done terribly well with them.  Considering that these have been babied along since January, I'm not impressed.  There are still more to go, but none of any size.  I'm thinking about either potato onions or forgoing them altogether next year.

This is today's harvest.  It seemed much more impressive earlier.  The last of the Pac Choy and Tatsoi were harvested.  They are starting to bolt finally and will be yummy in stir fry and egg rolls this week.  There are a few beets, cabbage, cukes, eggs from my girls, green beans and a few more onions. 

This week will be all about fall planting.  The bed that contained all my early cabbage, Asian greens, onions and lettuce will be completely ripped out.  In their place will go some of the seedlings started on the deck.  I'll also be direct seeding many other things. 

Back with updates

It's been a crazy few weeks.  The flooding has ended for most, with damp, moldy remains for many.  When the rain was finished, we proceeded to have 2 weeks of sunny, abnormally warm weather.  It's been absolutely wonderful.  With all the beautiful weather, it's difficult to hold back from planting out everything. 

Last night was a return to reality with below freezing temps and more to come tonight.  Thankfully I don't have anything out that should be affected.   Above you can see my garlic.  It's been coming up perfectly this year.  So far it looks like the best year yet for garlic.  It's something I use in most meals, so I'm happy to have as much as possible.

This is one of the cabbage seedlings.  It is only one of 3 that survived.  The bok choy and broccoli didn't make it either.  This seems to be what happens to me every year.  I'm not sure exactly what I do to kill them.  A few weeks ago I direct seeded more brassicas and they seem to be coming up nicely.  That may be what I do each year instead.  I think my biggest issue is that I'm planting them too early and trying to hold them inside too long.  I keep learning.

This is the lettuce that was seeded far too early.  (seeing a pattern here?)  I thought it was dead and just left it where it was.  Lo and behold, it's coming back.  Again, I'm learning.

Those hard to see wisps of plant material are my onions.  They were planted out last week with the brassicas and are doing quite nicely.  I'm very happy with how these behaved this year.  It's actually my first truly successful year for starting onions from seed.  Usually they are killed off by fungus.  I planted far too many, but they'll all get used.  

The main garden is all turned over now.  I rented a rototiller for the very first time.  I have to admit that I was absolutely terrified of the thing.  It turns out that it was a reasonable fear.  Hubby was off meeting a wedding client, but J was home as my backup.  At first the plan was to have J help me get it out of the truck and I would do the tilling.  Hah!  Then the tiller started dragging me across the garden.  Thankfully, J took over and in not too much time, had it all tilled up for me.  He looked like I had almost killed him, so when his wife came home, I thought she might kill me.  She just thought it was funny.  Have I mentioned how great my neighbors are?  

Lastly, the fruit trees are flowering and leafing out.  This is the 3rd year for this peach tree.  It's still not very big, but seems healthy enough.  We'll have to wait and see if it produces any fruit or not.  Since we're getting another freeze tonight, and it's still only mid April, we won't get anything.  The warm weather has everything blooming and sprouting earlier than usual.  Hopefully, there won't be too much damage to the trees and plants that came back to life early.  

There is so much going on here now, I'll be busy until next November.  I love it!

Sunning seedlings

It's gorgeous out today.  I thought the seedlings would like to be outside in all this beauty.  These are my bok choy, cabbage, broccoli and a few flowers. 

The onions came out to join in the party as well.

This is the very sad and overgrown lettuce.  It was in really sad shape.  I ended up transplanting it into my new hoop house.  I think it will probably not make it, but that's ok.  You live and learn.  I planted it far too early.  Another set of seeds will be sown today outside in the same hoop house.  Next year I won't make the same mistake.  

The rest of the seedlings will get hardened off and transplanted in a week or so.  The onions will need to wait a bit longer.  

This is the frame of the new hoop house.  It's a hodge podge of ideas from J and I.  I got the PVC poles and he added the wood and wire supports.  These were then covered with some handy dandy duct tape to protect the plastic from sharp edges.  The plastic will go up in a few hours.  I'll take another picture then to show the final product.  I'm hoping to use this as a mini greenhouse as well, in the coming weeks.  If all works out, we'll be making a few more to use next fall.  You can see how pathetic the lettuce looks in the far end of the bed.  I do believe I'm a lettuce murderer.  

Next on the agenda will be pea planting.  

Seedling update

 

These are the seeds planted on 1/31.  From left to right are Pinetree lettuce mix, winter density lettuce, bouquet dill and genovese basil.   They all came up quite quickly.  I had a heat mat under them until they germinated and then shut it off.  In past years I've done this in my chilly basement.  Even with the heatmat, I had very slow germination on everything.  This year they're in my schoolroom, which is still relatively chilly, but better than the basement, by at least 10 degrees. 

I'm really curious to see how the peppers do.  In years past, they've taken weeks to germinate and then were very slow to do anything.  I typically start them in mid February for that reason.  With the new setup, that may be too early, but we'll have to see.  

 

In this tray are my onion.  Yellow sweet spanish and red bull.  The yellow sweet spanish came up 2 days before the red bull, but both seem to be coming along quite nicely now.  The heat mat was turned off on those as well.  

My plan for next weekend is to start peppers, and eggplants.  It's still ages until anything can be done in the garden yet.  The ground is frozen quite solid, with snow in the forecast for midweek.  The month of February is always the month I decide that I want to move somewhere warmer.  It will never happen, but I wish it every year.

Sprouts already

 

They're up already!  Those are sprouts from Winter Density lettuce  and Pinetree Lettuce mix.  They are coming up rather quickly.  Just 2 days and I'm in business.  I love instant gratification.  

 

These are a little harder to see, but are sprouts from the Yellow Sweet Spanish onions.  The Red Bulls haven't poked their heads out yet.  Only 3 weeks until I can plant more seeds.  Patience is not one of my virtues.