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???

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.

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. 

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!

Double Diggin

The circle garden continues to grow.  Vinnie and Melissa here doin the good work.  The three of us de-grassed the two dark beds in one day.  By the time we were done with the 2nd ring, the method had been perfected.  As the circle grows so does our conciousness.           

The method is a combination of removing chunks of grass, and then double digging.  Double digging is a tecnique promoted by John Jeavons in the book How to Grow More Vegetables Than You Ever Thought Possible on Less Land Than You Can Imagine.  It is part of the biointensive system in which crops are planted closely together into raised beds and high yields are achieved on a small piece of land.  The French gardeners have been on to this for centuries, but Americans didn't catch on until the 70's.  The rings will be the biointensive raised beds that Jeavons writes about, and many worldwide practice.  The raised beds provide a fluffy medium in which the plants can easily spread their roots.  Beds are never walked on or compacted.  They drain and hold moisture better than flat, compacted ground.  They are dug deeply so that roots can grow deep into the soil, and therefore more plants can be crammed into a smaller space.  Beds are double dug by removing the first layer of soil, or topsoil, loosening the subsoil, and then returning the topsoil.  You are left with soil that has been worked to a depth of 2 to 3 feet, as opposed to the one foot that normal digging achieves. During sometime in the grass removing process it dawned on me...... while the chunks of sod were removed it would be easy to loosen the next layer... double digging.  Here is the process...

Strips are cut with the spade and removed onto the top of the bed..

The remaining topsoil is also removed.  You can see the contrast between the dark subsoil, and lighter subsoil.  The subsoil is compacted and hard, and it's this we want to break up

... no mercy on the subsoil



i'm doing a complete texturizing double dig, so shredded leaves, and a sprinkling of organic fertilizer are mixed in with the subsoil, keeping it loose.  The leaves will break down over time providing nutrients to plants, and fertility to the soil.  After subsoil and leaves are all mixed up, the topsoil we shoveled out is added back, and the rest is shaken off the grass roots.  

Just when you think you are done, think again.  Move over and start again.  It takes 5 to 10 minutes to do a 2 foot strip.  Once the whole bed is done we will mix compost and fertilizer into the top few inches of soil.  This method is very time and labor intensive, but it provides a very high quality space for plants to grow.  Making life easy on plants pays back in abundant harvests.  Take care of the earth and it will take care of you.   

   

Some creatures enjoying the unseasonably nice weather and pleasant garden vibes...

Tragedy and Triumph

Wild winds knocked over the mini outdoor greenhouse in a recent storm.  The tray of broccoli and the tray of kale on the top row weren't so happy. The scene inside the toppled greenhouse was messy and most of the seedlings didn't make it.

 All hope was not lost... A few babies did survive, and more seedlings were waiting in the flats to be transplanted.  A sad reminder that it's always good to sow more than you think you need.

36 cells, 36 broccoli seedlings left. I just love it when those syncronicities happen...



... To shed some light on the situation, some flourescent lighting has been added to improve the growth of the seedlings.  They are definately showing their thanks with lush, dense growth.

I purchased a 60 watt T5 flourescent light for $70 from the local hydroponics store

And the seeds just keep on popping up....

Breaking ground...

...And with a small prayer the ground is cut for the first time. 

 

It is a circle.  A 6 foot wide circle bed that will be the focal point of the entire garden.  Circles are sacred shapes and I saw my first circle garden at a very special place, Kaiwaka, New Zealand.  Ever since, I have wanted to create one of my own.  The middle of the yard just so happened to be the perfect size for a 3 ringed circle garden, with 2 foot paths and 3.5 foot beds (exactly how I would have made it anyway)  This diagram I found online will give you a general idea of what the garden will look like.  This one only has 2 rings. 

Heres how I did the measuring...

A string is tied to the center post and the radius' measured out on the string.  I pulled the string tight and walked in a circle, sprinkling flour onto the grass under the marks.  Once all the flour was down I could see where all the beds and paths would go.  I wasn't sure how I would transform the grass into garden beds, so I tried different combinations of tilling and pulling out chunks of grass and shaking off the dirt.  By the time the first ring was finished, I had decided that the tiller wasn't helping much.  The method I settled on was cutting out chunks of grass with the shovel, and shaking off the dirt back onto the bed.  No tiller, no tricks, 100 percent hand made veggie beds.  This method leaves me with a fine crumlby soil.  It takes a little more labor than the tiller method, but makes me happier with the results.  It also allows me to remove all of the wire grass roots.  Wire grass is the devil in a veggie bed.  It will spread underground and cause problems for years to come.  The hand shaking method removes 90 percent of the hated weed.  Luckily the soil under the grass has an amazing texture.  Not too sandy, not too much clay... a nice crumbly, humus filled loam.  I will definately be producing some top quality veggies using this soil as a starting point.  Thanks, dad, for growing luscious grass for the past 6 years!                   

   Marking out the directions of the paths... North, South, East, and West...

And in one day, the middle and the first ring are cleared of grass and mulched.  They are not finished, they will still have to be turned, composted, and nutrients added.  Until then, the leaf mulch will protect the soil from frost so the microbes can start doing their thing. 

Walla... a circle garden!