ORGANIC

Plant a seed, watch it grow...

Thursday, March 24, 2011

Circle garden... full

The paths have been dug up, the beds amended with compost and organic fertilizer, and as the first days of spring roll in, the circle garden is being stuffed full with leafy green vegetables...


Heres whats gone in...  sweet peas, red cabage, green cabbage, collards, green kale, black kale, purple kale, bok choy, tatsoi, chinese cabage, broccoli, cauliflower, green onions, leeks, cilantro, swiss chard, beets, turnips, radishes, mustard greens, and arugula!




...The sweet peas that never came up
 above...mint, below.. bokchoy (left) and tatsoi (right)
 kale is growing like crazy...
 luscious lettuce...

 me fixing the pea trellice, and looking forward to that first crunchy bite of sweet delicousness...


The sunroom is the only thing not looking so full this week...


Which means that it is time to start sowing summer crops!! Tomatoes and eggplant have already been started.  Soom to come will be cucumber and squash, and many types of herbs and flowers.

Monday, March 14, 2011

Tasty Leafy Greens

Well the weather is certainly starting to warm up a bit.  People might be starting to think about and plan their flower and veggie gardens.  Winter jobs like mulching, leaf gathering,  and bush trimming are still happening everywhere.  Lawns haven't started to produce much greenness yet. Meanwhile over here at the BroadBayCSA, food has already begun to be harvested and served at the table.  A head of lettuce a day to munch on, and micro salads of arugula and kale.  Not a valumptuous feast, but meager rations that are bridging the gap between fall storage crops like squash and potatoes, and the gush of spring bounty.  A visual tour of the recent plantings...

Tyler and I barely finished planting these collards today as the sun faded.

















Arugula and Bok Choy are loving it under the frost cloth...



Lettuce enjoying the protection from the two newly built cold frames (Found the windows on the side of the road as trash... neighbors re-did all of their windows and I harvested about 20 of them)


Also from the windows... My very own homemade greenhouse!! 

On the left, kale mingling with root crops and on on the right, kohlrabi chillen with baby spinach sprouts.


 Kale...                                                                              Beets, turips, carrots, and radishes...


It seems that I spoke too soon about the peas, for a couple of plants showed their baby heads today...


And looking very similar, and happy about the recent warmth is the seasons first mint...



Has anyone else planted any edibles yet???

Sunday, March 13, 2011

PEAS AND CARROTS - Ensuring your harvest

More than a week since I have sown snow peas and still no sign of germination.  I look at the soil and soil is all that I see.  I have heard that peas, having a high sugar content, can rot in the ground before germinating when the temperatures are too low.  This is a vegetable that likes to grow in cool weather, but needs warm soil to germinate.  One loophole to this obstacle is to trick the peas by presprouting them inside, then sneakily and carefully planting them outside in the soil.  I wanted to do a lengthy post about how to accomplish this, but while researching stumbled upon one that I quite liked.  So instead of trying to re-invent the wheel, heres the link...       http://blogs.icta.net/plover/2009/04/20/pre-germination/  ... I highly recomend reading this.


Monday, March 7, 2011

Lord of the Rings

The third ring has been conquered, thanks to the help of some loyal beer drinkers...


Looking out from my bedroom door...


Some of the seasons first greenery, upon which I have already begun munching...



And some more greenhouse lushiousness....



...all enough to make your mouth water and your hands crave the feeling of soft earth.  Just trying to tempt all you to come and help out in the garden. 

Thursday, March 3, 2011

Soil Block Trials

In his book, The New Organic Grower, Elliot Coleman describes a new, yet ancient, technique for growing seedlings.  A simple hand held device is used to create a cube made purely of soil in which the seedling happily grows. This cube replaces the common plastic plug trey that most American growers currently use.  Instead of being contained in the plastic cells, the soil, with the help of the plants roots and a lot of moisture, stands by itself.  The plants grown in a soil block do not get rootbound like its plastic dwelling counterpart.  Once the roots reach the edge of the soil block they simply stop growing, waiting until they come in contact with soil again.  This phenomenon is called air pruning, and has the potential to greatly reduce transplant shock.  Seedlings grown in soil blocks are said to be more vigorous,  produce sooner, and are more resistant to pests.  Not to mention all of the plastic saved.  This is just one of those things that resonated with me as soon as I discovered it.  So far, the trials have worked great.  Here is a four block maker in a bucket of very wet potting soil.    



Simply fill a container with soil, add lots of water till a peanut-like-butter consistency is reached, press the soil block maker firmly down till it is tightly packed with soil and...


Walla, four beautiful soil blocks with indententations for sowing a seed into each one.   


If the block was made properly, you should be able to pick the individual cube up without it crumbling in your fingers



And it gets even better... block makers come in a variety of sizes, as do the plugs that make the seed indentation.  One example is the 3/4 inch mini-block.  The 2 inch block can be made with a 3/4 inch hole in the top.  So when it comes time to transplant, the small (3/4inch) block can simply be set in the hole in the larger (2 inch) block.  A 4 inch block can be made with a 2 inch hole in the top.  This would be perfect for larger plants like tomatoes and peppers.  For now, most of my sowings have been directly in the 2 inch blocks.  This is because the early crops like kale and broccoli are very fast growing.  By the time they fill out the 2 inch block, its just about time to plant them into the garden.  Below is a trey of 50 blocks.  If I had used plastic, only 36 plants would have fit in this trey.  The young kale sprouts have just come up, but before you know it, they will be the size of their older brothers to the left.   


After the addition of a few more lights and many more plants, this is what the sunroom is lookin like these days...


Also not pictured is another 4 foot flourescent light, and an unlit table that holds 5 trays.  All in all, I can stuff up to 30 trays in this room.  Allthough that is a heck of alot of plants, its still not enough so I am currently concocting outdoor greenhouse plans.  This will act as a hardening off space, a place to put older seedlings that are soon to be planted into the soil.  An update on whats growing...

 Decisso Broccoli
Bloomsdale Spinach
Collard Greens
Winter Density Lettuce
Rainbow Lacinato Kale
Rainbow Chard
Sherwood Leek
Moss Curled Parsley
Bunching Onion
Tatsoi
Veronica Cauliflower
Cassius Cauliflower
Purple Vienne Kohlrabi
Evergreen Hardy Bunching Onion
King Richard Leek
Slow Bolting Cilantro
Krausa Curly Parsley
Astro Arugula
China Choy Chinese Cabbage
Texas Early Grano Onion
Paris Island Cos Lettuce
Eary Jersey Wakefield Cabbage
Starbor Kale
Samantha Savoy Cabbage
Gonzolas Cabbage
Super Red Cabbage
Vates Kale
Bellstar Broccoli
Snowball Cauliflower

some kale and kohlrabi and lettuce have already been planted outside and are growing well

these were direct seeded into the soil outside...

Bloomsdale Spinach
Tyee Spinach
Space Spinach
White Egg Turnip
Rover Radish
Cheriette Radish
Cherry Belle Radish
Detroit Dark Red Beet
Chioggia Beet
Mokum Creamy Carrot
Chantanny Red Core Carrot

And soon to be sown are snow peas... and much much more!