We are trying to extend our growing season a bit by placing some old windows on top of our raised bed. We've sealed most of the holes with straw in hopes to have a few more weeks of fresh spinach.
And now... it's time to harvest our sweet potatoes!
We cured these potatoes for a couple of days and then placed them in boxes in the garage. I hope they keep until spring!
We don't have much variety this year, but we have enjoyed an abundant harvest of tomatoes. I started out to make this year "the year of tomatoes" with about 75 plants making it to fruit production. My 5-gal bucket is overflowing at least twice a week and we've also been getting a scattering of jalapenos, banana peppers, bell peppers, and green beans. I didn't plant cucumbers and squash until late so hopefully we'll have at least a few of those by the end of the summer.
All these tomatoes means a lot of work. For a bucket-full of tomatoes it takes me about 2 hours to prep them for whatever we want to use them for. I peel, scrape and chop them up before they get used for much of anything. If I'm tired, then I just freeze them for later. If I plan ahead then I either make salsa for canning or spaghetti sauce. It's kind of depressing how little product all those tomatoes produce but the taste does make up for it! I don't think I'll be able to go back to store salsa ever again. We are self-proclaimed salsa snobs. The spaghetti sauce is pretty stinking good too.
The blackberries are in full force so I'm freezing about 2/3rds and baking with the rest as they come in. I've made 3 blackberry/blueberry pies so far and 8 halfpints of blackberry syrup. Straining the seeds is a pain, but the syrup if tasty in yogurt or on pancakes.
Good stuff.
Isaiah was finished so Sammy took over. I'm sure we'll see this a lot in their childhood.
Dill. Lots and lots of dill. I originally planted this dill to make pickles from all my cucumbers coming out of the garden about now ... only I never got around to planting any! Now all of this dill is drying in a closet in the basement. It looks like a Christmas tree is hanging in there!
We harvested 1/3 of our white potatoes this past weekend. I estimated that it's about 30 pounds. We still have 2 more varieties of white pototoes that are almost done and then a bunch of sweet potatoes that should be done in another 6 weeks or so. We will plant another round of potatoes to be harvested in the fall.
The turkeys have been cooped (ha) up in a 10x10 shed for about a month while we've been working on their separate run. Chickens can carry a bacteria that is fatal to turkeys so we decided to play it safe and separate them. Unlike chickens, turkeys can fly so they need a top to their run to keep them where we want them. We strung nylon string back and forth over the top of their run and then placed a lightweight bird netting on top of that. I hope they like their new home!
This is the view walking in the door of their shelter.
First ripening tomato! Now I have to decide what to do with about 200 tomatoes that are ripening fast!
We pulled this carrot a couple of weeks back and knew that they were pretty much ready to harvest. We had planted 4 different varieties and I wanted to have a taste test before they were all mixed up.
Varieties are (from left to right): Tendersweet, Rainbow Mix, Danvers 1/2 long, Scarlet Nantes
Tendersweet - mild and sweet
Rainbow Mix - the purple was excellent!
Danvers 1/2 long - strong carrot taste, less sweet
Scarlet Nantes - mild carrot taste and sweet
They were all tasty but my favorite orange carrot was the Scarlet Nantes. The purple carrots were the sweetest but I'm not sure if that variety can be bought outside of the "Rainbow Mix". I ordered these seeds from Gurneys.
You can't see it, but there is a 5 gallon bucket underneath this pile full of carrots as well!
After all the tops were pulled off, we harvested one bucket full of carrots. I selected the largest and the knarliest ones for the chair.
Cleaning and scrubbing took a while, but isn't it pretty?
The boys loved this one. This one "walked" around our house for a day or two.
Well, the handful of blueberries that have ripened on our tiny bushes have been excellent. We look forward to our future harvests.
Teeny tiny green bell pepper.
First jalapeno.
Corn patch. Sweet corn was planted about 3 weeks after these on the right. We should have 6 rows of corn.
Tomatoes. I need to get out there and do some weeding!
The apple tree that looks pretty dead. Pre-inland hurricane it was flourishing and had fruit this year. Post-storm it was almost lying on the ground from the winds. I don't know if will make it. We also have two peach trees that aren't doing so well.
We should have blackberries soon. These also took a hit from the storm but it was mainly the 1st year canes that were uprooted.
Cabbage and broccoli. These seem to take forever to grow!
One of the good 'ol hens.
Our roosters are getting pretty big and are starting to fight. The only hen in the picture is the white one.
Turkeys in their temporary home. We are fixing up their outside run and we should be completed in about 2 weeks. The most difficult thing about turkeys is that they need a covered run (because they can fly). Depending on which you have more of, time or money, a turkey run can be expensive or time consuming to cover. We chose cheap and time consuming with us fabricating our own *net* for the top of the run.
Our 4 short little rows of regular peas (not the snap peas) are heavy with fruit!
We picked the ones that were the fattest and had this much to shell. (Update: we had about 2 more harvests like this one before the peas plants were done.)
Out of all those pea pods, we only shelled enough for about one meal. Let me tell you that they did not make it until dinner. Fresh peas are my favorite vegetable of all time and I think I have 3 others that might say the same. I have no problem getting them to eat their veggies when they are straight from the garden. I actually have to limit them on how much they can eat!
If you've never had fresh peas I encourage you to grow some or get some from a farmer's market. They are delicious!!!
Snap peas are being harvested and eaten on the spot. Even Maddie loves to eat them!
Our apple trees had a few little apples on them. We are picking all fruit on our trees this year to promote tree growth instead of making fruit.
The potatoes are growing like crazy!
All but 1 or 2 of the tomato plants made it through the storm. I can't say the same for the pepper plants.
Corn!
We have a few blueberries on our young bushes.
We should have a bunch of blackberries this year. If... we don't have anymore hurricanes!
We've had good luck with lettuce and spinach so far this year. It's amazing how much can grow from those tiny little seeds. Even the kids are eating salads! I guess there are worse things than having to eat salads twice a day!
Further up the row are peas growing up their trellises. Carrots are after that and they are doing great.
What started as a science experiment has developed into "Isaiah's Bean Patch". We germinated the seeds in paper towels inside and then transplanted those to cups full of dirt. Two survived so well that we just had to put them in the garden. After that, Isaiah decided to make a sign so everyone would know his area of the garden. Sammy has decided that he'll own the corn patch.
Some of the peppers. We have banana, serano, jalapeno, and a couple of varieties of bell.
Two of three types of white potatoes.
Dinner!
Oh yes, and the tomatoes. We now have about 75 tomato plants in the garden. For a while I thought I was going to lose at least half of them to wilt, but they bounced back from the brink of death. While they were pruney I bought more transplants at the feed store. Oops. We will be busy very soon.
Our garden so far is head and shoulders above where we were last year at this time. However, it has rained for a couple of days in a row and things are a big soupy mess. I hope it dries out soon!
The garden is coming along so far this year. We have peas (2 kinds), carrots (4), red and white onions, spinach (3), lettuce (3), potatoes (3), and broccoli (2). We've already planted 24 tomato plants and today we are working on planting more tomato seedlings that have outgrown my bedroom windowsill.
We planted 2 boy seeds and their coming up just fine!
Here's a shot of the garden so far. (Please excuse the various junk lying around) The raised beds are in the foreground with most of the green early plants. Over by the wagon (upper left) are the cattle panels that we are using to support most of the tomato plants that are in the ground already. I still have about 40 or so tomato plants to be planted and we are making supports for them. We had the extra cattle panels so we thought we would try them out on the tomatoes.
I am LOVING working in the garden this year. Last year was a disaster mainly because our soil was hard clay and I didn't keep up with the weeding. This year I'm all over it and it helps that Maddie is better at walking in the aisles and not all over the plants. Of course the real heat is about 2 weeks away and I'll probably be singing a different tune when I have to go out and weed when it's 95. Our fruit orchard around the corner is doing well... meaning that everything is coming up, growing and green. In year 2 I don't think I can ask for more than that!
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