Winding Down

As the garden winds down for the year, it seems as though so is the blogging.

Over the past few weeks everything excluding the carrots and turnips have been harvested and removed from the garden.  Unfortunately a lot of it is literally just lying around the house while we keep our fingers crossed that it will ripen. At the moment there are spaghetti squash in the living room in front of the windows and green tomatoes covering a table and the floor in the basement while others are hanging in the cold room.

The spaghetti squash needs sun and warmth to ripen which is why it has taken up residence in our living room; I am glad to report it is slowly turning yellow. (That’s a good sign.)  There hasn’t been much change in the tomatoes but there are a few that are starting to turn red. (We might get some after all!) 

We do have one lonely zucchini plant in the garden that is living under a permanent cover of burlap.  When I picked the last of the zucchini two weeks ago I left one plant as it was just starting to form a few zucchini and I was curious to see if they would develop.  The last time I looked they were still growing, slowly, and more leaves and buds seem to be growing as well.

The beets, both red and yellow, have be picked and pickled, the onions and garlic and drying in the cold room, the last of the swiss chard has been blanched and frozen, and the potatoes are drying in the wheel barrel in the garage.  The turnips (what doesn’t have worms) should be cleaned and blanched within a few days, and the carrots will probably be staying in the garden until Thanksgiving weekend.

I have an assortment of shorter blogs started regarding specific vegetables so be prepared to see and handful of new entries posted later this week. (hopefully)

Standing in the garden this afternoon seeing it so empty was both exciting and sad.  After a long summer of gardening it’s exhilarating to pull the plants knowing you don’t have to worry about them anymore; it gives you the freedom to move on to other things.  At the same time it’s sad because, well, it is done.

Not much left, 'tators are gone now too...

It’s kinda ironic but as one garden winds down, the next is already being planned.  While standing in the near empty garden this afternoon, and on a few other occasions, we’ve already had discussions of what to plant next year and how to do things differently.

Frost: A Silent Killer

For a garden, frost can have huge implications.  In the spring it can wipe out your new seedlings without hesitation and in the fall it can kill mature plants spoiling their fruit and an entire summer’s work in one night.

The average first frost date in Grande Prairie is September 13.  So far we’ve had “damaging” frost three times this year.  I say damaging frost because excluding these occurrences, there were signs of frost but the garden was not affected.

The first damaging frost occurred on the evening of September 1.  Because of the warmer days it was hard to imagine having a frosty evening so I reluctantly threw some burlap over the spaghetti squash.  The next morning the spaghetti squash was warm and cozy and the zucchini, tomatoes, and beans all had their top leaves burnt and killed by the frost.  Thankfully it was not a hard frost, but it was enough to do damage; it saw to the end to most of our zucchini plants.

The second occurrence was a few days ago (11^th) and was a hard frost, it fact, it actually froze.  This time we had the tomato plants, squash, zucs and beans covered and they survived reasonably well.  Instead of fighting with poly and small pieces of burlap, we dug out a huge tarp and covered just about everything in one sweep.  Surprisingly, the potato plants got hit extremely hard; they now are all brown and withered and will have to be harvested soon. 

The past week has seen frost on several occasions: I am beginning to see trend.  I was planning on picking everything that is above ground this weekend but ended up starting to pick the tomatoes mid week.  With the weather being cooler and the days shorter things are not going to ripen outside so it’s time to bring them inside and see what some warmth can produce.

In this country frost is a nudge telling you that it’s time to wrap things up, it’s a watered down preview of things to come.  I guess I can’t complain too much as we were lucky to avoid frost throughout the spring and summer months (if you exclude the June snow).

What’s been goin’ on...

The past 2.5 – 3 weeks have been a busy time for me.  Thankfully our summer was surprisingly extended until last Sunday.  The weather over the past few weeks has been well above seasonal with some of the hottest days of the year; we even came close to 30C a few times. 

The last week of August I took some time off from work and I made use of just about every minute.  I wasn’t planning on spending the week in the garden but ended up there just about every day for some reason or other.  If I recall correctly I spend 2 – 3 days picking, blanching and pickling beans, one day pickling cucumbers (Steve managed to get a hold of 20 lbs for me), one day picking and blanching swiss chard and peas.  Just by looking at everything in my freezer I know I did more but it’s all such a blur right now.  I don’t know how I would have managed to get everything done had I not had the extra time.

Needless to say everything is the garden is close to being done and it is starting to look a little anemic.  If it wasn’t for the warm weather it would have been done a while ago; most days I wish it was done already. 

After their last harvest the peas and green bean plants were removed.  The yellow beans are still in the garden and have just recently stopped producing; the green were pulled because we simply just didn’t want anymore.  The red beets have recently been removed as well and have already been pickled; the golden beets are still in the garden until I figure out what to do with them. 

The warm weather was a welcome gift for our sunflowers as it gave them a boost and they are now flowering and hopefully the frost doesn’t kill them for a while.  Unfortunately the warm weather didn’t help our tomatoes and we still don’t have any that are ripe.  We’ve had frost a few times and have taken to covering things at night because it would be such a waste to lose the green tomatoes and squash out of laziness.

Looking at the forecast I have a feeling the rest of the garden, excluding a few root veg, will be removed and brought inside this weekend.  This is something I am actually looking forward too; it’s the time of year where I’m ready to move on from the garden and do something else.

I’ll post some pictures from the past few weeks on facebook in the next day or so.

The Spinach Experiment

About three weeks ago, ironically just after complaining about being overwhelmed, I had a crazy idea. 

I had just returned from the Farmer’s Market where I had gone in search of spinach.  We didn’t get much spinach out of the garden this year so I thought it would be nice to buy some so that we would have more in the freezer to last through the winter.   There wasn’t a single vendor at the market that had any spinach and I was told by one that “you can’t grow spinach this time of year.” 

This got me thinking, why can’t you grow spinach this time of year?  I’ve tried a second planting of spinach two years in a row and have yet to have any success.  So I got on my computer and started doing some researching.  As it turns out spinach is a cold weather crop; it does best in the spring and in the fall and it is one of a few plants whose seed has a very poor germinate rate.  Also, if you plant spinach in the warmer months, it simply will not grow.  Once temperatures reach 23C it becomes dormant; seeds will not germinate and plants simply refuse to grow.

As the weather was cooler and it was mid August, I got the crazy idea that I would try planting some spinach.  I took to my computer again to see how I could increase my odds of success.  One common suggestion that I kept coming across was to soak your seed and to get it to sprout before planting.

So here I was, August 13, soaking spinach seed for a fall planting.

After soaking the seeds for almost 24 hours, I transferred them onto damp paper towel that was laid on a plate and covered them with another damp paper towel placing another plate on top; it was kind of a damp paper towel and spinach seed sandwich with plates for the bread.  The idea was to keep the seeds moist by keeping them in direct contact with the paper towel.  Twice a day I sprayed the paper towel with water to keep it damp.  After one day the seeds started to sprout.  We left them in the paper towel sandwich for a few days and then planted them in garden.

Seeds Sprouting after a day on the damp paper towel.

Sprouts planted.

Once planted, we watered them regularly and waited for something to happen.  Within 3 – 4 days it started to grow; and then it disappeared.  Everyday we checked it and saw new growth but the next day it was gone.  We had failed to take into account something very important.  That something was the over abundant amount of grasshoppers; they were eating the spinach as fast as it could grow.

New growth to feed the grasshoppers. :(

We tried covering the new growth to keep the grasshoppers from eating the spinach but then the weather turned unseasonably warm, we got tired of fighting the grasshoppers and eventually gave up.  It was frustrating because if the grasshoppers weren’t so plentiful I would probably have a decent amount of spinach in the garden right now.

It was an interesting experiment and if grasshoppers are a non-issue, I will attempt a fall plantings of spinach in the future.

Potato Outlook 2011

Despite getting a late start and being nibble on by grasshoppers, our potato plants seem to be doing very well this year.  We’ve had a few plants start to die, from too much moisture we think, but overall they are doing much better than last year.  By the end of August last year most of the plants were dying and had to be pulled because we didn’t want the spuds to rot in the ground or be eaten by the ants.

Last year we battled ants, grubs, and potato scab and our yield was very low.  So far this year we’ve pulled a total of two plants, both Norlands (red), and if our findings are any indication of the rest of the potato patch, we’re gonna been eating a lot of spuds this year.  Each plant we pulled had a yield probably equal to that of 3 plants last year.  We’ll try to leave the potatoes in the ground as long as we can so they can continue to grow; once they are harvested we’ll store them in burlap bags in the cold room.

partial harvest from 1 plant

Our two biggest issues with the potatoes are scab and grubs and unfortunately it is very difficult to do anything about either one.  Neither seems to be much of an issue the year, or at least as far as we can tell, so far…

Potato Issue #1: Common Scab

Potato scab is a bacterial disease that affects the appearance of the potato; it results in tan to dark brown, rough-textured lesions/scabs on the surface.  Scab can be introduced to your garden by planting potato seeds that have scab, or by adding manure or dirt that has the bacteria present.   Because the bacteria that are responsible for scab lives in the dirt once you get it you’re pretty much stuck with it.

That being said, certain potatoes are more resistant to scab than others.  Norland potatoes are one of the most resistance variety and Yukon Gold are one of the most susceptible variety; both of which we planted.   You can also try to control potato scab by adjusted the pH of your soil; the more acidic your soil is the less of an impact scab will have on your potatoes.  Adjusting the pH of your soil is easier said than done though, especially when you have a garden the size of ours!  This fall Steve wants to add lime to the garden in attempt to lower the pH.

Scab on last years Yukon Gold

Thankfully, scab only affects the appearance of the potato and the flesh just under the skin (if severe enough) and does not make your potatoes un-edible.  They only downfall of having potato scab, in my opinion, is you end up having to peel a lot of potatoes.

The Norlands we’ve dug up this year have shown signs of scab but once exposed to the air and cleaned it is extremely difficult to see.  The scab is so small it looks like little pen dots.  We have yet to dig up any Yukon Gold but I’m guessing the scab will be more evident on them, similar to last year.

The tiny white spots are scab on 'tators fresh out the ground.



Small brown dots are scab on 'tators after being cleaned & dried.



Potato Issue #2: Grubs

In previous posts I’ve mentioned grubs but I’ve never really discussed them.

The grubs we have in our garden are the larva of either the June Beetle or Chafer Beetle.  They are white or yellowish and have fleshy, wrinkled, C-shaped bodies with a darker head and six spiny legs close to their head.  They vary in size with the mature grubs being about the size of a quarter.  They are a gross little bug; Steve says they look like aliens.  We hate grubs.

Grubs feed on the roots of plants and are more known for causing severe lawn damage.  They can also cause serve crop damage to home gardeners and farmers.  This year I think it was grubs that were eating the roots of my young beets, spinach and swiss chard.  Last year they only noticeable grub damage was in the potatoes.  Grubs can be devastating to your crops; they don’t just nibble on the potato, they actually eat part of the potato leaving the rest to rot in the ground.

So far this year they don’t seem to be much of a concern in the potatoes.  Out of the two plants we’ve pulled we’ve only see one grub and only one small potato showed damaged.  Hopefully this is an indication of things to come.

Grub damage in last years harvest, see the holes?
(bottom left & top right)

Like every other pest in the garden, grubs are next to impossible to get rid of without using harsh chemicals.   I think like any other bug, they have their cycles and some years will be worse than others.   I’m hoping they didn’t like all the rain at the beginning of the year and either drowned or went deeper into the soil to escape the moisture.

The preferred method of getting rid of grubs organically is to use beneficial nematodes.  Nematodes are small microscopic worms that will seek out grubs and other soil born pests and kill them.  They infect the grubs, using them as a host for their young, eventually killing them.  Unfortunately nematodes are quite temperamental.  They are sensitive to temperature, your soil temp needs to be consistently above 15C, and the soil needs to be damp, the wetter the better.  A dry, cold soil means dead nematodes.  We tried using them last year without much success.  (It was too hot & dry and we didn’t have the water to keep the soil consistently wet.)

Another method is to trap the beetles before they burrow into the dirt to lay their eggs: there are scent traps you can buy to attract and trap the beetle.  We’re not too sure of this because it has the potential to make the issue worse by attracting more beetles.

This year we planted the potatoes in a different part of the garden in attempt to “hide” from last years grub infested soil.  We’re also hoping that if we can get the pH of the soil down the dirt will become less hospitable to them and the will go away. 

One can always hope.

My Jam & Jelly Day

I haven’t been doing much of anything lately as I have been consumed with picking raspberries.  We have so many berries and I hate to see them go to waste so for the past few weeks I have been picking berries almost every other night.  Since the berries have started to ripened Steve figures we have picked close to 5 gallons of them and there is likely still plenty more to come. 

The bulk of the berries have gone into jam and my first attempt at freezer preserves.  Last Saturday I refer to as my “Jam & Jelly Day” as I spent all day making jam, jelly and preserves.

Saturday started with me scalping the rhubarb and picking through the stocks for the cream of the crop: I only wanted the red tender stocks.  Some of the rhubarb went straight in the freezer for baking and some was turned into jam or jelly.  This was my first attempt at making any jam or jelly with rhubarb and I made Blubarb Jam (blueberry and rhubarb) and Rhubarb & Orange Jelly.  I taste tested as I went along and I am quite pleased with the flavor of final products.  I ended up with 8 - 246 ml jars of the jam and 6 – 246 ml jars of the jelly.

I’ve made raspberry jam on numerous occasions and was confident in the outcome.  When making jam I’m always amazed and how much sugar is used.  Unfortunately you can’t cut back on the sugar because if you do your jam won’t set properly.  I’ve tried “reduced” sugar recipes that use a different type of Certo (pectin) and the flavor just isn’t the same so I stick to the regular “full” sugar recipes.  We don’t eat a lot of jam so I’m not overly concerned about the extra sugar being consumed.   Anyway, I cooked up two batches of jam and if I recall correctly I ended up with 20 – 246 ml jars of raspberry jam.  Have I mentioned before jam makes a wonderful Christmas gift for just about anybody??

Raspberry Jam (left), Rhubarb & Orange Jelly (centre), Blubarb Jam (right)

This was also the first time I had attempted freezer preserves.  The process is similar to making jam but without adding any pectin to thicken it.  The flavor was spot on but I think I over stirred it because I was expecting to have more “chunkys.”  Next time I’ll know better!  I ended up with 4 – 16 oz cups in the freezer.

I was also planning on making some freezer jam but thanks to Steve, just before I started, we realized all the lids on the containers I had bought were cracked.  That stopped me dead in my tracks; which was a good thing because it was time to be done with my Jam & Jelly Day. 

My day had start with cutting rhubarb around 11:00 am, and it ended when the last pot was clean at 10:00 pm.  It was a long day but it was nice to get everything over and done with in one day.

I hope all of you that end up with jam or jelly at Christmas appreciate it!

Quick Update - Day 100

August always seems to be a pivotal summer month; it is the summer month I remember the most (because it’s the last) and it’s the month (in most areas) that can make or break a garden.  In my opinion it’s also the month with the nicest weather.  Thankfully Environment Canada was wrong (again) and the month has turned out to be considerably nice with some of the hottest days of the year.

The warmer weather has been a welcome gift for the garden.  It has spurred the growth of everything: the peas and beans are now heavy with vegetables, there are finally too many tomatoes to count with some starting to change color, the dill has matured, the sunflowers are huge and forming buds, the zucchini is now ready to be picked and the squash are starting to develop.  Because of the exceptionally warm days and evenings over the last weekend, all my zucchini plants now each have two or three zucchini that are ready to be picked and the baby squash have grown from the size of a ping-pong ball to that of a small water balloon.

 August is also the month were I start to spend less time in the garden.  For some reason the weeds become less of an issue and I focus more on harvesting and eating the fresh veggies as opposed to fretting and weeding.  The only thing that needs to keep up with is the watering.

A few nights ago we had beans and swiss chard with dinner, and last night we ate our first zucchini accompanied with dill garden potatoes.  August is also the time of year where you try to eat as many vegetables as possible while they are fresh as can be.  Garden veggies in the winter taste wonderful but nothing is as immediately after it was picked.

I am very thankful for the warmer weather and hope it decides to stick around a little longer.

** I'll post more photos on facebook :)

Wonderfully Overwhelming?

At times having a garden can feel overwhelming.  Previously the weeds and the desire to get rid of them was overwhelming; now having to deal with all the mature vegetables is overwhelming.  When looking at the garden I have a hard time thinking of each vegetable separately; I see one thing that needs to be harvested and feel that everything needs to be harvested and dealt with all at once.

Last weekend I spent Saturday picking and shucking peas.  (I think I ended up with 16 cups of actual peas.)  On Sunday I picked and washed about a third of the swiss chard and blanched it, I blanched the peas too.  And that was my weekend.  When I think of how long it took to do those two things I get stressed because of what is still left to be done.  And then Steve comes to the rescue and brings me back down to reality:  the reality that everything is just fine where it is, growing in the garden, the reality that just because the peas need to be harvested doesn’t mean everything else does too.

I looked back at my photos from last year and discovered this: we pulled the potatoes September 4(because the plants were dying), the zucchini plants were pulled September 5(they had stopped flowering), I harvested and pickled my beets September 11, the tomatoes were brought inside September 14, and the carrots were pulled October 4^th.  And why is it I feel the need to do everything right away?  I have no idea.  The fact of the matter is there is still a lot of growing time left, and if the weather man is correct, some of the warmest weather of the summer!

As the garden has just recently begun to produce mature vegetables we need to take advantage of it; we need to stop being lazy and start eating the fruits of our labor.  This week I implemented a new rule in our house.  That rule being this: we need to eat something out of the garden everyday.  It’s a rule that makes total sense – why have a garden if you aren’t going to eat your produce when it’s at its freshest?  Since the rule’s inception we’ve had fresh carrots in spaghetti sauce, peas & carrots as the nightly veggies, and tonight we had a roasted beet & feta salad.  Tomorrow could be a challenge as its pizza night – how does one get fresh veggies on a pizza?

My new rule also helps “un-overwhelm” me – the more veggies we eat fresh, the less there is to blanche and freeze.  This weekend I think I may have to pick more peas before they get bitter and should probably pick more swiss chard before the grasshoppers do more damage.  I’m also planning a “Jam & Jelly Day” on Saturday, sounds like another busy weekend!

(I’ll post more photos on The Thirsty Dirt Facebook page.)

Damn ‘dem Hoppers

This year we are having trouble with a new sort of pest – grasshoppers.  Areas in the County have seen higher than average numbers of grasshoppers and until recently, this did not affect us.  Just within the last few weeks we have started to notice a number of them in the garden and at this time I would be tempted to call it an infestation.

Depending on the time of day, when you walk through the lawn, or garden, all the grasshoppers try to jump away from you creating a wave as you walk through them.  Once you stop it sounds like heavy rain; that’s the sound of all ‘dem hoppers landing.

A while ago I read an article in the newspaper talking about all the grasshoppers this year: they said the grasshoppers weren’t doing any damage. Ya right, they need to come look at my garden.  Just about every plant has been nibbled on, some more so than others.  The plants with the most damage are the potatoes, swiss chard and spinach.  What little spinach growth there is has almost completely been eaten, the swiss chard is full of holes and the edges are trimmed back and most potato leaves, especially the plants along the edge of the garden, have leaves trimmed back as well.  I just hope they stay out of my tomato plants; they’ve had a rough enough year as it is.  And disgusting as it sounds, there’s a lot of visible grasshopper poop around too.  Oh, and they are enjoying the sunflower leaves as well.  In the evening when it starts to cool off the grasshoppers congregate on the sunflowers and bask in the evening sun. 

Little buggers!

So how does one get rid of grasshoppers?  Apparently the best way to get rid of grasshoppers in your garden is chickens or ducks followed by guinea pigs.  Did you know guinea pigs eat grasshoppers?  Does anybody have any chickens I can borrow?

Apparently another good method is to dust your plants with all purpose flour; I guess it gums up the grasshopper’s mouth and then they can’t eat and die.  For some reason you can only leave the flour on your plants for two days and then you have to wash off it off and wait a week before reapplying.  I think I’ll pass on this option because I don’t feel like washing flour off my plants as I think it could be a real chore – I’d rather chase every single one with a fly swatter.  And of course there is my ever so faithful DE.  Apparently dusting plants with DE can also help control grasshoppers.  I’ve started to do this and the numbers seem to be decreasing; I’m not sure if it’s the DE or other environmental influences.

My boss has a garden and we discuss our gardens almost daily.  He suggested I catch them and start making chocolate covered grasshoppers – any buyers?

Photos of Some Damage:



Bean leaves trimmed back and with holes



Swiss Chard trimmed back and with holes

Trimmed back... ok... eaten potato leaves

Baby Spinach Remains

The Weather is “Berry” Nice

All the rain we’ve received this summer has turned out to be a blessing for the raspberries.  The moisture paired with the warmer weather we’ve been experiencing, in my mind, has created perfect growing conditions for our raspberries.

Every day when we get home from work, even before going inside, it’s our tradition to go check on the garden.  Now that the raspberries are finally ready, chowing down some fresh berries when checking the garden is a must!  It’s astonishing to see how many berries there actually is.

We have so many berries it’s difficult to know what to do with them yet we feel obligated to pick them and not allow them to go to waste.  Our berries have such a wonderful flavor; they are sweet with a slight yet not over powering tartness.  We love the taste of a ripe raspberry that was picked a few seconds before popping in your mouth; quite often we just pick and eat as we go – why dirty a bowl?

Last Sunday I picked some berries for the first time; I ended up with about 8 cups.  Yesterday (Wednesday) I picked some more; this time I got about 12 cups.  I try to pick only the ripe berries and leave everything else until they are completely ripe.  I find that there is usually a new batch of fresh berries every 3-4 days.  There are so many berries we try to only pick the “perfect” berries and leave the deformed and underdeveloped berries for the birds and bugs.  Are raspberry bushes are also thorn less, making picking quite painless.

As much as we would like to be like bears and live off raspberries, I don’t think our tummies would appreciate it.  So what to do with all these berries?

(1)     Jam – As my supply is running low, it’s time to make some more raspberry jam.  I normally make cooked jam with pectin and store it in sealed jars.  This year I think I’m also going to make some freezer jam/preserves.  The two types are basically the same but one uses pectin and gets stored in sealed glass jars, and the other has no pectin and is stored in the freezer.  (FYI: the traditional sealed jar jam makes wonderful Christmas presents.)

(2)    Raspberry Sorbet – last winter I used a bucket of frozen berries to make Raspberry Sorbet in my ice cream maker.  It was unbelievable!  It makes a wonderful cold treat and preserves the taste and tartness of the berries perfectly.  It’s also a good way to use lots of berries.

(3)    Raspberry Lemonade – This is something I haven’t tried yet but I think I will love.  Basically all you do is make a pitcher of lemonade, crush and strain some berries, and add the berry juice to flavor your lemonade.  And now that I think of it, I could just as easily make Raspberry Ice Tea.

(4)    Freeze ‘em – Because the picked berries don’t last long in the fridge, unless you are going to eat them within the day I would recommend freezing them.  If I am going to use the berries in jam, sorbet or for juice, I wash them quickly, put them in a bucket and in the freezer they go.  If I want to be able to use the whole berries at a later date, I meticulously pick through them looking for the best of the best, placing them on a cookie sheet and then freezing.

      Once frozen, I take them off the cookie tray, package them in containers and of course store in

      the freezer.  If you do this your berries won’t get smooshed and when they thaw you’ll have nice

      whole berries.  The whole berries are wonderful on ice cream, cheese cake, angel food cake,

      custard, etc.  I love warm custard in the winter with raspberries.

The bugs may be bothersome when picking berries, but when I think of the things I can do with them and how much money I’m saving by not having to buy them, it’s worth every bite I get!

Garden Update #4 - 81 Days

The past week has been a wonderful weather week.  It has been quite warm, 25C, for close to 4 – 5 days and the garden is loving it!  It’s quite amazing to see what some warmth after a lot of moisture can do for your garden.

The zucchini and squash plants are filling in and finally starting to produce.  We should be able to eat some zucchini within the week, I can already taste it!  The baby squash are growing slowly but at the moment I’m just glad they are growing.

Thankfully the tomato plants are finally starting to bare some fruit.  Every time I walk by them I see more tomatoes and some of them are getting to be a decent size already – we might end up with some vine ripened tomatoes after all.

My garlic is still yellow as can be, but it’s not dead so hopefully we’ll still get some bulbs out of the deal.  Until this year I had never plants onions from bulbs and the bulbs I did plant are huge onions now; so huge they might need to be thinned again.  The green onions are doing fine and I think it might be time to thin the shallots again – at least now I can keep what I pull and we will have mini shallots to use.

All the root veg seem to be growing exceptionally well.  Although the carrot and beet plants vary in size, they are all developing wonderful surprises that are hiding in the dirt and will taste fabulous.  So far we’ve had carrots out of the garden a few times.  This year I planted a different type of carrot, they aren’t very sweet but have a real earthy taste; next year I might have to try another type as we would like a bit more sweetness.  We haven’t had any beets yet, I try to leave them for canning, but I’m tempted to pull some of the golden beets for a roasted beet & feta salad… yummm.

Last year 99% of my turnips were full of little white worms.  I was able to savage some of them by slicing and dicing and only keeping the good parts.  This year I keep the plants dusted with DE in attempt to keep them bug free.  This works, hopefully, by preventing the survival of the eggs that are laid on the turnip leaves (that hatch into the worms/larva) from flies and little white butterflies/moths.  I’ve been very diligent in keeping the plants dusted as I am just starting to see the little white beasts, I mean moths, flying around.

As for the Swiss Chard, it’s time to harvest it.  It is a rich dark green color and has developed into large, crinkly leaves.  If it’s not harvested soon I fear the grasshoppers will eat it all. (I won’t get side tracked here, I’ll post separately about our grasshopper problem.)  Because the Swiss Chard will continue to grow after I pick it, I’m hoping that we might get a second growth out of it if I pick it now, and hopefully the grasshoppers won’t devour the new, tender growth.

Hmmm… what else…  BEANS & PEAS!  The peas are still growing like mad and we will have to pick some this weekend.  The plants are full of pea pods at various stages of development and there are still flowers blooming so there is more on the way!!  The beans are also making excellent progress; there are many, both green and yellow, that are close to being ready to pick.  In fact, I think there is probably enough green beans for a meal.  The beans like to hide and fool you; all you see is plants but when you go looking under the leaves there are hundreds of beans.  I love fresh beans.  We normally blanche and freeze what we can’t eat fresh but this year I might try to pickle a few.

As far as the potatoes go, we are undecided as to their progress.  We have yet to see any flowers and a few plants are starting to die.  I think they may have had too much moisture.  This weekend I’m going to get Steve to dig up the plants that are dying to see what is happening.  Oh, and the grasshoppers love potato leaves so I’ve taken to dusting the potatoes with DE too.

And finally the sunflowers.  They are also being attacked by the grasshoppers but have grown leaps and bounds in the past week.  They have really benefited from the heat and at this rate we might still end up with a row of blooming sunflowers this fall.

And last of all there are the raspberries.  I think maybe we should open a U-Pick this year; yes, we have that many berries!  (I’ll talk more about our raspberries later.)

So there you have it, my 81 Day Update.

If You Grow It, They Will Come – Part 2

We haven’t seen too many deer around this year.  But just because we haven’t seen many doesn’t mean they are not around.  Steve thinks we don’t see them as often as last year because of the abundance of food for them.  I agree with him but also think that we don’t see them because in the evening the bugs are so bad they can’t stand still for too long.

By Mid July last year the deer had managed to get into our garden at least twice: feasting on the beets and swiss chard.  As far as we can tell we’ve succeeded in keeping them out of the garden this year.  We’ve even had the opportunity to watch the fence at work.

On at least three occasions we’ve seen deer near the garden this summer.  They all seem to be caught off guard by the fence.  They see the plants in the garden, walk up to the fence and as soon as their nose touches the fence they stop dead in their tracks.  Because of the fine mesh I don’t think they can see it and something touching them that they can’t see startles them.  They usually stand still for a minute or so, moving their head using their nose to test the fence (or seeing if it’s still there) and then walk away.

On all three occasions the deer’s ears were twitching like mad from the bugs and their little tails (they are Mulies) were flapping so fast I thought they were in danger of taking off.  One evening we watched a pair of young bucks in the field feeding on the clover.  The bugs were so bad that night they couldn’t stand still and eat.  Steve says they were eating like caribou; eating and walking at the same time.

Last week we had a bit of deer entertainment.  One night we spotted a deer near our garden, she was feeding on some clover a few feet away.  Once she had her fill of clover she walked over to our garden looking for dessert.  As soon as she got close to the fence, she stopped and bobbed her head a few times looking startled.  After realizing something was preventing her from walking into our garden, she turned around and went to our neighbor’s garden.  She knew exactly where she was going too.

Checking Out the Fence

Walking Over to the Neighbor's Garden

 Once at the neighbor’s garden (they have no fence), she began to gorge herself on their peas and whatever else suited her.  We watched her walk up and down the rows munching on a little of this and a little of that.  She really enjoyed their peas; she would pull the plants out root and all and just num them right up!  It was pretty funny to watch – especially since it wasn’t our garden.

Enjoying a Snack of the Neighbor's Peas

Once she was done there, she thought she would try our garden again.  She walked over, got all weird when she got to the fence, and then turned around and bounced back into the bush.

I guess the fence works… what do you think?

Gardening Essentials

It’s funny how a person changes with age.  All those things we once swore we’d never become, well, it happens.  Ten years ago (ok, maybe 15) if I were to garden I would probably have done so in the heat of the day, covered in sun tan oil, with as little clothes as possible. And of course I would have been too stubborn to wear a hat.

Now I try to avoid the heat of the day, cover myself in sunscreen, wear a sunhat and gloves, and make sure I have a water bottle handy to keep myself hydrated.  I always seem to wear my “garden pants” or capris; I never wear shorts because I can’t stand getting my knees caked with dirt or kneeling on the hard ground.  I keep telling myself this has nothing to do with age; I’m just smarter now then I was before.  (And it definitely has nothing to do with the fact that I can’t handle the heat like I used to.)

Anyway, getting back on topic...

Every time I head out to the garden I grab what I consider my essentials: spray on “Cooling Mist” sun screen, sun hat, gardening gloves, water bottle and my I-pod Shuffle.  Once in the garden my tools consist of a little hand held spade and a 15 gallon weed bucket.  At that’s it.  (This year I’ve had to add mosquito repellent to my list.)

My number one item is my Shuffle; I would be lost without it.  It’s usually turned on before I leave the house and it normally doesn’t get shut off until I’m back inside.  It’s nice to block out the traffic and lawn mower noise and just be in my own little garden world.  One added bonus of my Shuffle is that it saves my sanity by blocking the buzzing of mosquitoes and therefore reduces the need for mosquito spray.  I am lucky to still have my Shuffle – it’s gone through the washing machine once and thankfully still works!  Ten years ago I never would have listened to anything while outside; I would have been on high alert for any noise thinking every little thing I heard was a bear because I had/have a severe fear of bears.  Thanks to our deer fence and garden gate, I don’t have to worry (too much) about bears sneaking up on me and as long as I stay facing the gate nothing can sneak up and scare me.

When it comes to gardening there are tons of gadgets, widgets and hoojaas that a person could use.  I get tempted with everything and try not to get sucked in.  Over time I have learnt that all the nifty, trendy garden gadgets only end up costing me money, don’t usually work or just make things more difficult.  I figure people have been growing gardens and working in them since almost the beginning of time and they didn’t have access to the things we do now: and they probably had better gardens then we have today.

There are some tools that are a must for gardening. ie: rakes, shovels, hoe, hose, watering cans, etc.  One piece of advice I have to pass along when it comes to buying these items is this: don’t cheap out.   On occasion we have tried to be cheap or bought something because it seemed like a deal.  History has proven that when we make these purchases, 99% of the time the item gets returned because it’s a piece of crap or it breaks within the first few uses. 

To repeat myself: don’t cheap out, buy the good stuff the first time and save yourself a lot time and headache.