President’s Day Gardening

On President’s Day, as I was finishing lunch, I looked out the window and saw snow! We’ve had practically nothing since Christmas, and now on the day I was finally ready to work in my garden, it decided to snow? I ran outside as fast as I could, determined to get some work done before it got too cold. Half way through, the flurries stopped, and it was just cold. The first step to getting a garden ready is cleaning up from last year. My chickens did most of that for me, when we let them loose on the garden during the winter, but there was a pumpkin vine they didn’t touch and a bunch of those giant prickle weeds, so I grabbed a huge garbage bag and started filling it up. Then I made my way to my smaller boxes and started cleaning those up. They were mostly full of some sort of grassy weed, as I had harvested everything from all but one box last year.

Chickens digging through the grassy weed.

Chickens digging through the grassy weed.

Delicious winter carrots.

Delicious winter carrots.

The box that still has food in it is full of carrots, because they over winter beautifully, and since this winter was so mild, I didn’t even have to cover them. I cleared out the grassy weed from this box as well, and fed all of the weed to my chickens. I figure it’s some sort of annoying grain, which chicken’s love, and they’ve been enjoying digging through it. I, also, suspect that this weed helped to insulate my carrots when the temperatures did get cold. So, this weed and I don’t have too bad of relationship, especially considering how easy grass is to pull out of Mel’s Mix.

Thistle. These are all over my yard, even in my grass.

Thistle. These are all over my yard, even in my grass.

This weed and I, however, have a very complex relationship. Thistles are considered a noxious weed, which means it’s attempting to take over the planet. No, really it means harmful, poisonous, or very unpleasant. In this case, all three, though it is only mildly poisonous. When they bloom, they’re deathly beautiful, but they kill to even lightly brush up against. Don’t wear flip flops around these things. I’ve been collecting any of the dead flowers I can find, in a probably futile attempt to prevent them from growing in my garden. They’re so hard to get rid of that even digging them out doesn’t stop them from coming back. Once I had a thistle so big that a colony of ants made it their home. That was gross.

Clean garden box and large garden pot, ready to be planted

Clean garden box and large garden pot, ready to be planted

After a quick, though not thorough, clean up, I devoted my energy to one box. My chickens used it as a place to dust bathe in, so there was lots of chicken manure and feathers strewn about it. I left them there and hoed them in, while breaking up the Mel’s Mix to make it nice and soft for this year. The dirt was thawed completely, and I wonder if it even froze this year. After about fifteen minutes, the box was ready, except for needing a little compost for added nutrients. I don’t know if my compost pile even did anything this winter, because there wasn’t any snow to insulate it while it rotted. I’ll be checking the bottom of the pile later this week to see if I need to buy some compost or not, and then, I’ll be planting Tom Thumb Peas. I’m very excited to eat them. Combined in a stir fry with the carrots planted last year, it’ll be delicious.

Red Cabbage

IMAG0698My red cabbage is finally ready to pick. I planted it as a start all the way back at the beginning of April. It survived frost after frost and heat wave after heat wave (yeah, that’s Utah for you), and now I finally get to devour it. This was probably the easiest thing I’ve ever grown. It’s taken such a long time to grow that I’ve never had to worry about it going to seed, and I just watered it everyday to get it to grow. I’m not sure yet what I’m going to cook with it, possibly a coleslaw, but I’ll be scouring Pinterest to find exactly what I want.

Eggplant Blossoms

IMAG0707I am not a fan of eggplant. I have tried many times to find a recipe that I like it in, and every time I receive the confirmation that I do not like eggplant. Even still, I planted it in my garden this year. I have heard and read many times that it is a beautiful plant, so when given two for free, I decided that at the very least, I would get the joy of seeing what an eggplant plant looks like. Today, while inspecting my garden, I was graced with the beauty of the eggplant blossoms. They are the most beautiful purple color I have ever seen, and it’s almost a shame that they will eventually turn into eggplants, but hopefully I will be able to find a recipe that I like or someone that will take them all off my hands.

Tomato Plants!

Our tomato plants have been in the ground for almost two weeks now, because the weather was unusually warm for this time of year. Even with the recent cold spell just last week, it was still warm enough that none of our plants needed covering, particularly our tender tomato plants. While I was only planning on eight tomato plants this year, which is way more than enough for our little family, my supplier, who just lives down the street, was very generous and provided us with two extras for free. Since I don’t have room for them in my yard yet, they are in the biggest pots I can spare until we find space for them.

Sweet Pea Opalka

To make space for the eight that are actually in the ground, my amazing husband pulled up all the grass three feet out from the house along the West wall. It was no small task to be sure, but I am so grateful he did it, because it looks amazing, and is a perfect spot for growing tomatoes. We choose the West wall, because it gets tons of sun in the afternoon and evening. Tomatoes need warm roots and plenty of sun for photosynthesis.

West Wall

So, let me introduce you to our tomato plants. First, we have a Sun Sugar and a Golden Rave. The Sun Sugar is a cherry tomato that tastes like candy in tomato form. The Golden Rave is a paste tomato, which means it as more flesh than juice. Like the name says, it’s going to be a golden color, and it will be the shape of a Roma.

Sun Sugar and Golden Rave

Next in line, we have a Paul Robison, which is a black tomato, and a Monica, which is another paste tomato and essentially a Roma.

Paul Robison and Monica

Then we have a Hamson. I am super excited about this one, because it was designed specifically to do well in Utah. It can be whole packed, which means canned as a whole tomato, instead of sliced or diced. The Caspian Pink is a large Russian tomato that is pink!

Hamson and Caspian Pink

And, finally, we have a Black Krim, another black tomato, and another Sun Sugar. We have been called crazy for having two Sun Sugars, because one plant produces a lot, but I now they will all be eaten.

Black Krim and Sun Sugar

The tomatoes in pots are a Sweet Pea, a tiny cherry tomato, and an Opalka, a large paste tomato.

Plant Protection Barriers

We live very close to a mountain. So close, in fact, that deer wander our neighborhood. It’s a bit of an adrenaline rush to watch deer racing up your street and through the vacant lot at the top. So, on top of bugs and birds, we also have to protect our garden from the deer. They love to eat my tulips. Combine that with having two kids, and I am thoroughly deprived of their beauty. They, also, love to eat strawberry plants! Thankfully the few plants that were nibbled on recovered, but I wasn’t about to chance loosing twelve strawberry plants. So, we built protective barriers to put around our garden boxes. The instructions that we followed came from The New Square Foot Gardening book, and proved to be very simple and very light. We can move the barriers whenever we need to access the plants, and we can water right through them so that we aren’t constantly moving them.

Making Covers more zip ties

 

To make them, we used 1″x2″x8′ boards, cut down to the sizes we needed, 1 1/2″ screws, 2′ wide chicken wire and 4′ wide chicken wire, a staple gun, and zip ties. For the strawberries, we needed a 2’x4′ cover, so we cut the boards accordingly and screwed them together. Then we stapled a 4’x4′ piece of chicken wire on one of the 4′ sides, and stapled a 2’x 8′ piece around the other three sides. We folded the 4’x4′ piece in half to form the top of the enclosure, and then zip tied all the edges together. Leah enjoyed handing us the zip ties, sometimes one at a time, and sometimes all at once.

zip ties Baby Trap

We cut off the extra part of the zip ties, so they wouldn’t get in the way when gardening, and for aesthetics. And, we discovered that these make great baby traps. Even the trapped enjoyed playing in it.

Adorable Cutie

2013 Garden Update

We’ve been working on our garden since March, and since we already had two square foot garden boxes in place, I was able to plant as soon as the ground defrosted. It’s been about a month and a half, and we have fantastic lettuce, onions, and radishes on their way to becoming a delicious salad. The swish chard and carrots are taking their time, because I didn’t sprout them before I planted, but they are still coming. I’m trying out red and green cabbage, broccoli and cauliflower this year. These are wonderful for a spring crop, because they can be snowed on and still survive. It’s almost like they do better the colder it is.

Cabbage and Such Lettuce

We’re ripping up grass by the side of the house to make way for more garden boxes. This house came with far too much grass (a.k.a. dandelion field) and I’m trying to find ways to get rid of some of it, so that my poor husband doesn’t have so much to mow. I planted strawberries in these new boxes, in hopes that these plants will survive a few years, and I won’t just rip them out when all the other annuals are dead. Sadly, the deer like strawberry plants and ate the leaves off of some of my precious plants. We’re currently working on a way to keep them protected from the deer, while still getting enough sun and water. The upside to having cooler weather is that I don’t feel totally weird when I cover my boxes with sheets to keep the deer from eating them.

Strawberry Plants Potato Plant

And, in some pots, until we clear out the weeds from the space we intend to plant them in, are some thornless raspberries. We put them in the larger pots, because they were becoming too big for the pots we bought them in. Plus, they’re able to take advantage of the fantastic Mel’s mix we surrounded them with. And, in the other pots are potatoes! What? Potatoes in a pot? Yeah, I’ve no idea if it will work, but they’re growing, and I have a fun blue variety in there.

Raspberry Plant Jonathan Apple Tree

Some of our friends have enough land to plant their own little mini orchard, and in the spirit of having fruit in your backyard, we bought our first fruit tree! Yes, just one, compared to their twelve, but it was all we could afford at the moment, and the only tree I was sure I wanted. We got a Jonathan Apple tree. These are by far my favorite apples ever, with a wonderful tart flavor, and perfect for whatever you want to do with them. We won’t be getting any fruit off of the tree for another three to five years, but it will be wonderful when we do.

In our future, we’re planning to rip out three feet of grass along the entire west side of our house. We’re going to plant eight tomato plants there, and I am super excited for it. We are getting many different varieties this year, some for canning, some for saucing, and most for eating. Since I’m new to canning, I’m sure I’ll even end up freezing a lot of them. We’re getting our plants from here. The guy who grows them lives just down the street, and it’s been really fun to watch them grow from seeds. I, also, have enough weeds cleared for another square foot garden box, and will soon have space for a second.

Protecting My Spring Crop

While, I am extremely grateful to be out of the dry spell from last year, it has caused me to care about plants in a way I never have before. This is the first year in my gardening history that I have taken the time to monitor the weather and cover my plants should freezing temperatures occur. Covering plants raises the temperature around them by about five degrees, so when the low of 31°F hits around 5 A.M. tomorrow morning, my plants should be a cozy 36°F.

To cover our plants, we just used some bed sheets that my mother-in-law gave us when she was decluttering one of her closets. Some of them are flat sheets, and some are fitted. We use them all. The fitted sheets work great around our square foot gardening boxes. The elastic holds them decently in place. We use the flat sheets for our garden beds right against the house. To secure the sheets, especially tonight with all the wind, we take advantage of a pile of rocks left to us by the previous owners. We were going to throw them away last year, but we’re very glad that we didn’t, because I don’t know what we’d hold the sheets down with otherwise.

These precious strawberry plants are now protected from the wind and any snow that my come our way tonight and tomorrow.

These precious strawberry plants are now protected from the wind and any snow that my come our way tonight and tomorrow.