Garden 2012 Recap

We tore the garden out two weeks ago. I need to figure out the totals and then I'll get them posted.

The cocoa mulch I added at the beginning of the year has broken down nicely. It will add nutrients etc when it's tilled in. Due to the cost though, maybe do straw for rows next year.

All in all, I think the garden was successful this year. Not bad for the first time having a real garden here and hard as a rock, heavily compacted soil.

Next year -

Add a least one more plot
Maybe put pink pumpkins in the 3 Sisters Plot after/with zucchini
Spread out tomatoes, this year they were way too crowded
Black Krim tomatoes are a must
Cherry tomatoes are a NO

Update: 

Zucchini: 151.51 lbs

Pumpkin: 0.65 lbs

Jalapenos: 5.8 lbs

Green Bell Pepper: 2.25 lbs

Red Bell Pepper: 0 lbs

Sweet Banana Pepper: 3.73 lbs

Beefmaster Tomato: 0 lbs

Plum Tomato: 0 lbs

Sweet 100 Cherry Tomato: 0 lbs

Black Krim Tomato: 0 lbs

Rutgers Tomato: 0 lbs

Carbon Tomato: 0 lbs

Pantano Romanesco Tomato: 0 lbs

Unfortunately I did not get a good measurement of my tomatoes. I had tons and tons though.

Tomatoes are Ready!

The purplish ones are Black Krim. They are heirloom and very tasty! Also shown are Beefsteak, Rutgers, Roma and Sweet 100 Cherry. Oh, and ever-present zucchini :)

Zucchini...

Would someone please remind me next year that I do not need 7 zucchini plants... Not counting last night's harvest, I have harvested over 42 lbs of zucchini. Some has been given away, some has been made into zucchini relish, most is in the freezer and a few have been made into zucchini fries (yum).

I am getting a few peppers now, sweet banana peppers and one green bell pepper. It would have been two, but the one had a big hole in it. Jalapenos are almost ready. I cannot wait to make cowboy candy (candied jalapenos).

Sweet corn and pole beans. Can you see how the pole beans are climbing up the sweet corn?

Vegetable plot - Marigolds are doing well, tomatoes are almost as tall as I am.

Vegetable plot

Pumpkin is almost ready... This is the compost bin transplant. The seed came from one of those small decorator pumpkins. I never knew how much pumpkin spread... this thing is huge! Two pumpkins on it so far, but tons of flowers. I just hope we'll still have some for Halloween!

The chickens enjoyed some pen time while I checked out the garden.

Connor just loves his tractor...

Garden June 26, 2012

I forgot to post these... Taken June 26, 2012

First sweet banana pepper

First green bell pepper 

Zucchini

Pumpkins

Cute rain gauge

Sweet 100 cherry tomato is taking over the marigolds

Zucchini

Zucchini!

So far, I've pulled 16.34 lbs of zucchini out of my garden.

This was from this morning -

I saw these half and full bushel baskets at Tractor Supply Co. I had to get one. They remind me of the bushels of potatoes my great-grandpa Meyer always had in the garage. These have not been processed yet. The others have been shredded. I have about 16 cups in the freezer waiting to be made into bread, muffins, relish or whatever else.

Speaking of relish - 

I made 4 half pints of Ball's zucchini relish. I kept out about a tablespoon and mixed it into tuna. Yummy! I will definitely be making more of this!

Garden - June

I added 5 bags of cocoa shell mulch to the vegetable plot. Smells great and can be tilled into the garden at the end of the season.

Trying to determine if this is powdery mildew starting on my zucchini.

And yes, I need to weed.



Pole beans are coming up in the 3 Sisters plot. I am going to have to get stakes though because corn didn't come up in some of the hills. I am considering getting a few more bags of cocoa mulch and doing this bed too. 

Garden - May 2012

May 30 -
Veg plot - No sign of the Mon Petit Cheri green beans, not even seeds. I think the birds got them. Scraped that row and put in 1 Rutgers tomato, 1 Black Krim tomato, 1 Pantano Romanesco tomato, 1 Carbon tomato (all heirlooms), 4 sweet basil plants, 1 thyme and 2 French tarragons. Added 4 more jalapenos.
3 Sisters plot - Sweet corn is coming up in most hills. One hill has nothing. Sowed Kentucky Wonder pole bean seeds. Transplanted pumpkin from compost bin. Planted 7 zucchini plants and 2 lemon balm.
Rhubarb plot - No sign of rhubarb or carrots. Onions coming in nicely.
South side chicken pen - No sign of anything but weeds.
North side chicken pen - No sign of sweet basil, planted 1 sweet basil plant and 1 lemon thyme.

Garden - May 2012

May 14 - My uncle came over and tilled a foot wide section on the long sides of the chicken pen, a plot for rhubarb and two 10x10ish plots.

May 15 -
North side chicken pen - sowed sweet basil seeds
South side chicken pen - sowed bird & butterfly seed mix
Rhubarb plot - planted three rhubarb crowns, about 15 yellow onions, carrots
3 Sisters plot - sowed sweet corn seeds in hills

May 18 -
Veg plot - planted 2 red bell peppers, 2 green bell peppers, 2 banana peppers, sowed a row of Mon Petit Cheri green beans, planted 2 Beefmaster tomatoes, 1 plum tomato, 2 cherry 100 tomatoes, 3 jalapeno peppers

Pics From The Weekend

New sign on the chicken pen:

I got it at Target on the Easter clearance. It had a stake for a yard sign, which I took off. It was originally $10, I got it for $2.50. I sprayed it with sealer and will remove it before winter. It's not quite what I wanted for the pen, but it's cute.

Surprise in the compost bin:

I checked out the compost bin this weekend and found a pumpkin vine. I plan on taking down the compost bin this week anyway. This just tells me that it's not getting hot enough. I threw in pumpkin hulls in the fall. It should have killed whatever seeds the chickens didn't eat. I will just throw the chicken manure across the back pasture. Rabbit manure can go right on the garden.

Garden Plans

I'm going to have to scale back my garden plans a bit, I think. Tight budgets will do that! My one chocolate party this month was rescheduled for next month due to uncontrollable circumstances so I haven't had any money coming in. I need to save some money for my college reunion next month - hotel, gas and food on Sunday...

Here's a rough plan:

2 Blueberry bushes - $4.88 each - $9.76
2 Blackberry bushes - $4.88 each - $9.76

1 Allstar Strawberry - $2.98 each - $2.98
1 Ozark Beauty Strawberry - $2.98 each - $2.98

3 Jalapenos - $1 each - $3 (provided I can still get them at this price when I'm ready in a few weeks)
1 Gypsy sweet pepper - $2.98 each - $2.98
1 Yellow Bell Pepper - $2.98 each - $2.98
1 Red Bell Pepper - $2.98 each - $2.98
(Tomatoes of some sort, various prices)


Herbs for the butterfly garden pots
1 Lemon Thyme - $3.38 each - $3.38
1 Boxwood Basil - $3.38 each - $3.38
1 Chocolate Mint - $3.38 each - $3.38

Seeds $1-3/packet, 1 packet each
Sweet Corn
Squash

So I'm looking at roughly $50-ish without tomatoes. I know I can get tomato plants for fairly cheap. I may skip the strawberries and just get a bucket from the local farm stand. Maybe we'll just take Connor and pick our own. I think a bucket of already picked is around $12-14 and so sweet.

I thought I had a lead on rhubarb plants, but it turned out to be burdock. I haven't seen rhubarb crowns anywhere. I'd love to have rhubarb...

Strawberries....

I bought two bags of strawberries from Walmart yesterday. I didn't notice it until I got home, but the one bag has two labels. Under the AC Wendy label is one that says Earliglow. It came out of the AC Wendy box (must have been delivery day, I opened the box, so know it wasn't mixed), and both are June bearing, no big deal if it's not truly an AC Wendy.

I'm going to put these in the old horse pasture behind the chicken coop. I tried to use the garden hoe to loosen the area (mostly weeds and clover) and I think I'm going to have to rent a tiller. I really didn't want to, but the ground is really hard. I plan on planting quite a bit more and don't want to hoe for 50+ hours... I also want to mix in the contents of the compost bin and horse manure pile.

Don't forget to check out the new Sunwood Farms 365 photo blog!



eta: 4/26/12 - These strawberries did not make it. The roots were rotten.