WEED SEEDS!

I  Know Better

Composting...

2014 started off a bit slow.  The winter would NOT go away.  We had record amounts of snow fall, record low temperatures, and a freeze that would not quit.  I was excited this year, because I was going to be using compost from my very own supply.  2 years of yard waste, fall leaves and food scraps were cooking for a long time and this was the year I was going to introduce it to my garden.  The beneficiaries were to be the two 4'x4' beds (the 2nd eldest in the family).  I loaded my wheel barrow 3 or 4 times and topped off the beds with the sweet smelling darkish brown GOLD...my very own recipe!  I have been waiting for this opportunity for years now and here it is.  I sowed a bunch of seeds: bunching onions (scallions) Champion radish, French Breakfast radish, mustard, Lola Rosa lettuce, arugula and Corvair spinach in the first 4x4.

 In 4x4 #2, more scallions, Kaleidoscope carrots, sweet carrots, Bright Lights Swiss chard, Gailon (hybrid kale/broccoli) and Razzle Dazzle spinach.  I also popped in radishes in between rows here and there.

My excitement was high.  I believed that this would be my best start yet. Then I began to notice seedlings popping up everywhere (even where I did not sow anything).  They all looked the same and so it dawned on me that my compost may have been filled with weed seeds.  So I went to my compost bin and sure enough, COVERED with weed seedlings.  I realized that a large portion of my compost pile was grass clippings (my lawn is not weed free).  The pile was filled through and through with the little budding plants that are now filling my raised beds.  I KNOW BETTER!  I have listen to my boy Mr. McGrath time and time again say that lawn clippings should stay on the lawn, and weeds that have gone to seed should be discarded.  I failed to heed that advice and henceforth contaminated my beds with TONS of weeds.  Once again, you live and you learn.

Never the less, my beds are doing fine now.  They require constant weeding, but it gets easier as the weeds grow larger.  As you can see below, I also added some strawberry plants and marigolds (to keep the bad buggies away). This bed will likely be a strawberry patch next season...planning ahead.

Here, this bed is doing fine with marigolds, leafy greens and radishes popping out everywhere.  One thing I can say is that I have had 0.00 luck with Razzle Dazzle spinach.  I cannot seem to get it to grown with any fervor.  There are plenty of varieties of spinach and Corvair kicks ass in my garden...so THERE!

As of March this year, my two compost bins are FILLED, 4'x3'x3' with fall leaves, coffee grinds and a splash of grass clippings.  That should cook up quite well and be void of any weeds come time to add it to my beds. That time could not come quick enough.  I am ripe with enthusiasm for this batch of compost.  Time will tell.  DAMN WEEDS! 

Year in Review

2013...a year in review

Time flies

So much has happened since my last posting...last year.  I am officially a teacher now.  Well, substitute teacher, but I am almost done obtaining my teaching certificate.  Needless to say, I have been a slacker when it comes to my garden and this blog.  Teaching has dominated my time...grading, lesson plans, professional development, grading, lesson plans.  Well, you get the idea.  Anyway, last year was pretty awesome when it came to my garden.  I added a new 4'x8' raised bed that I built with bamboo harvested from my property.  BAMBOO (running bamboo) is a BAD choice for a landscape because it is unstoppable!  Technically a grass, it has a voracious growing habit and will grow horizontally 8-12' underground on a bad year.  So, my tree line is ripe with bamboo. 

As you can see, I harvested some rather tall bamboo stalks from my tree line. I embarked on a mission of stripping the stalks of leaves, and after several hours this was the result. 

They were ready to become my new raised bed.  Organic Gardening has a great article on building 5 different varieties of raised bed gardens.  The Wattle method was my choice for the bamboo stalks.  It was harder than I expected and not quite what was described in the article, but the finished product speaks for itself.  The bed was filled with a mix of bagged top soil (probably be more selective next time on this one) and local municipal compost.  Lawrence Township has a WONDERFUL municipal compost site and they produce BLACK GOLD!  It is yard waste compost, primarily fall leaves collected from all over the township.  If you live in the township, it is free for the taking (a fee to out-of-towners).  

This guy was my tomato patch this year.  The bed was home to cherry tomatoes, 2 varieties of heirloom tomatoes, bell peppers, banana peppers, basil, viola and Elijah Blue Fescue I was nursing back to health from my front landscape.  Early in the season, the production was good, but blight struck again and "Down went Frasier!"  Another season cut short by airborn traveling disease.  

The season was better than the last, again.  I am learning more and more every year and 2014 was on the horizon.

They Bolted!

Can't beat the heat

A few hot days in May and everything starts to bolt!  If you are unfamiliar with the term...let me splain.  No it's to much...let me sum up.  When a plant "bolts" it means it is going to seed.  OrganicGardening@About.com does a lovely job defining "Bolting." Typically, lettuce, spinach or some more tender leafy greens will suddenly sprout a flower stalk and in just a few days, there is a lovely flowering plant where your spinach used to be.  Or in my case, spinach, arugula and cilantro...all bolting with a few days of each other. The cilantro is quite beautiful once it has gone to flower.  I left a few standing to aid in keeping the evil doers (bad bugs) away, but the heavy rain over the past few days quite literally beat it down and only 1 still stands.  I described this to my friend Robin, who is starting her first garden this year (DO YO THANG!) and her response was, "What's the point of growing them?"  Well, that is an excellent point.  One cannot determine what curve ball nature will throw our way on any given day, much less any growing season.  

So what is the point of growing these beautiful greens if only a few short weeks after you may have dropped them into the ground, they are bolting and gone for the season?  

That is one hell of a heading!  Well, as a wise man (or woman for that matter) once said, "Timing is EVERYTHING."  It is important that you take into account the information that is widely available regarding the types of plants you grow and the approximate dates they should be planted.  Many times that information is right on the back of your newly purchased seed packet...and then there are other times when you have seeds and there is no information whatsoever on when and how to plant them.  Please see below.

On the left, lots of useful information...on the right, zip, zilch, nada.  

So, there you have it.  What to do?  This type of situation is exactly what the interwebs were made for!  There are tons of sites that will give you planting information based on what zone you are in.  Does anyone know what I am referring to when I used the term "ZONE?"  Zone refers to the USDA Hardiness Zones and The Vegetable Garden.info offers a great resource of information on timing for all varieties of plants.  Just punch in your zip code, and they will give you your USDA Hardiness Zone, then simply click on the zone you are currently residing in, on their website and up will pop a long list of plants and timing.  As my son Fletch would say, "Easy peezy, lemon squeezy."  

Here is the Sisk Family Farm as of 5/20/13.

Here are my Mortgage Lifter Tomatoes (left) Super Sweet Cherry Tomatoes (right of center), Sweet Banana Peppers and Red Bell Peppers (right edge).

Mesclun greens in front, Mustard greens next, Champion Radish behind and to the left.

My pride and joy...Lupine, flowering beautifully!

Arugula (left), Lupine behind (you can see the one and only flower), Red Russian Kale, Tuscan Kale, more Arugula and finally Yellow Onions.

Other half of the earlier bed, Romaine (left), Lolla Rosa, Peas behind them and the Spinach and Cilantro in the rear, just prior to being harvested for the last time this spring.  I created a trellis for the peas to grow up on and they seem to be utilizing it as I had hoped.  I snuck in some Sweet Corn that I started in my basement in late winter between the peas and cilantro.  It is hard to see, but I hope that changes in the next few weeks.  

Last but not least, Pac Choi (left), a singular flowering Broccoli Rabe, Chinese Kale/Broccoli in the center and Chard on the right.

Many, many, many leafy greens and root vegetables can be grown both as a spring crop and again as a fall crop.  This especially goes for Radish and my favorite Spinach (try a Spinach Cesare salad...delicious!).  They will be back!  

The weather is perfect for planting...and so I am off to sow some Black Valentine Bush Beans, Blue Coco Beans, Hericot Vert Bush Beans, Champion Radish, Mucher Cucumber, Nasturtium and Yukon Gold Potatoes.  

Wish me luck!

Spring Has Sprung

Here comes the sun...do da do do!

Or something like that.  Well, there have been a handful of beautiful days recently.  Even one day that hit near 80 degrees...according to the Subaru Forester!  

Farewell, My Subaru...great book.  

Here is a snap shot of what my garden looks like as of a few days ago.

On the right, Chard, moving left is Chinese Broccoli, and then Broccoli Rabe.  These guys were casualties of frost earlier this spring...it was a miserable morning.  This sad event has been well documented in this blog.  I really need to just get over it!  Ok...I'm over it.  In the last row on the left is Bok Choi, seeded a few weeks ago and doing just lovely.  Chinese Broccoli (or Gai Lan) seems to be recovering well from the wounds of the overnight chill, Chard is doing fine, but Broccoli Rabe...they were hurt pretty bad.  I had such high hopes for these guys.  You might notice some plastic sheeting and the wood slats on the edges of the garden.  I used the plastic after that first frost to protect the seedlings over night from the next few frosts.  I made one big mistake...I left the plastic on during the day light hours on 2 occasions.  BIG MISTAKE!  I drove the temperature up so high under the plastic that the surviving Rabe decided to bolt...and I don't mean run away!  They began to flower...way too early!  And so, I have mostly puny, plants with florets and full blown flowers growing.  There are 1 or 2 guys I am looking forward to.  Not all is lost.  

In this bed is Yellow Onions on the right, Champion Radish and Corvair Spinach, then seeded Arugula, Red Russian Kale and Tuscan Kale and in the left row is Lupine and more seeded Arugula.  This is the first year I am growing Onions, any type of Kale, or any type of perennial flower like Lupine.  I figured if I can grow veggies for my family, I can grow landscape plants for my home.  The onions were started from sets, basically small onions grown the previous season (think pearl onions).  Again, you see the plastic, but on this bed I used green fencing cut to size and rolled over the top of the bed as a sort of hoop house.  GENIUS!  All is well in this bed.  I already harvested a few radishes and they were GRRRRRREAT...like Tony the Tiger.

My pride and joy!  My very first raised bed I built last year.  This guy is solid and is doing fantastic!

This is the rear of the bed, with Romaine and Lolla Rosa in the front, Snap Peas behind, and Cilantro and Corvair Spinach in the back.  I am still amazed at how well the Cilantro and Spinach are growing...these guys are the winter survivors originally planted last September in another bed.  I transplanted them with little hope they would thrive.  There will be salsa in the Sisk house this year!

This is the front of the bed and mostly seeded crops.  At the bottom is Mesculn Greens, then Mustard Greens, more Champion Radish, Kaleidoscope Carrots, and finally Razzle Dazzle Spinach.  I planted a great deal of spinach!  It is good for you...so we will eat spinach!  

Plastic Lesson Learned

My intentions were good, as my wife would say.  I wanted to protect my plants from the frost utilizing cold frames, hoophouses, mini green houses...whatever you want to call it.  I succeeded in saving an a great deal of plants from death my mildly chilly weather, but I also cooked some veggies prematurely by lazily leaving the plastic on during the day.  The Broccoli Rabe got the wrong message and decided that their growing season was nearing its end.  Grow Organic has a great article on making a hoophouse for your garden, and as always, my boy Mike McGrath (host of You Bet Your Garden)and the Gardens Alive website has some excellent information on hoophouses/row covers to extend your growing season.  I hope my mistakes help in some twisted way!  Peace.

Seedlings and Stuff

Spring is for lovers...of gardening

March is finally time to get outside and see what's happening in and around my garden.  I did spend a bit of time a week or two ago pulling weeds and leveling my raised beds.  In my earlier post I spoke about my unfortunate situation with the latest frost this spring.  Patience is a virtue...and one that I have not inherited from any member of my family.  Many of my seedlings have grown quite well this year and I sprouted some snap pea seeds (patting my own back) and so it is time to transfer them to the garden.  

The snap peas were sprouted indoors, but not in any growing medium.  There is a trick to sprouting peas with out using any seed starter, all you need is a paper towel, zip top bag and water.  Take a doubled up paper towel and give it a good soaking, not dripping, but thoroughly wet.  Lay it out and put your pea seeds on the wet towel and fold it over.  Fold over the sides like a little paper purse and slide this into the plastic zip top bag.  Zip it about 2/3 of the way and mark the date.  Check them every day and add water to the towel as needed to keep it very moist.  In a few days, usually no more than 3 or 4 the seeds will poke out their initial root and they are ready for the garden.  These were much easier than the seed starting I did in my basement/garden center.  

Spinach, Shasta daisy, Red bell peppers, Basil in front; Viola, Lavender, Banana peppers, Parsley in rear 

Romaine, Chinese broccoli, Broccoli Rabe, Lupine, Lolla Rosa in front; Tomatoes in rear

All and all, seed starting was a success!  Time to transplant and so I took a trip to the Lawrence Township Ecological Facility and picked up about 1 1/2 yards of compost (black gold...great quality and best of all, FREE to Lawrence Residents...most townships in NJ will have a comparable facility) and sprinkled the fairy dirt over my raised beds to feed the newly planted and new to be planted seeds and transplants.  

Swiss chard and Lolla Rosa

After the Chard, Broccoli Rabe, Chinese Broccoli frost debacle, I was gun shy on moving anything else to the garden.  But after a bit more research, there are certainly some candidates that are ready, like Radish.  So off they went.  And by early April, I had moved a large variety of seeds and transplants into the garden.  I direct sowed a variety of seeds: Mesculn Greens, Mustard Greens, sprouted Snap Peas, Kaleidoscope Carrots, Champion Radish, Arugula, Red Russian Kale, Tuscan Kale (Thank You Shannon), Bok Choy, Razzle Dazzle Spinach, mixed varieties of Basil, Tomatoes (again, way way way too early to plant these) Romaine, Lolla Rosa, Lupine, and...I think that is it.  Wish me luck!

Corn in front, radish in rear.

I cannot wait to get this sweet corn in the ground!

January 2013

Seeds of Exchange!

This year I decided to do a bunch of research pertaining to seed starting indoors.  After 3 failed attempts (if one would refer to the past feeble starts as attempts) this year would be different.  I began with ensuring I had the proper light sources.  I ventured into my basement and pulled together all of the shop lights I had.  There were 3 48" light fixtures and each required 2 48" t-12 40 watt fluorescent bulbs.  

The light looks just light this guy does.  After checking them all out, only 2 of the 3 worked and so I began with these.  My radio friend, Mike McGrath has plenty to say on the subject of starting seeds indoors on the Gardens Alive A-Z Archive. Especially concerning the type and amount of lighting necessary.  It turns out that most newer shop light fixtures require t-8 32 watt 48" bulbs and these light are more efficient than their elders, the t-12's.  You go to seed starting with the lighting you have and not the lighting you want...so here I went.

I began my seed starting adventure in early February.  I had saved a number of containers of all sizes from last years garden purchases and so I had my beginnings at home.  I took great care to clean each container with a bleach and water solution (1 part bleach, 9 parts water).  Soaked them for a few minutes and rinsed them thoroughly.  I purchased a bag of Jiffy Seed Starting Mix (Organic) from my local Wegmans (I LOVE THAT STORE!).  This mix's primary ingredients are spaghnum peat moss and vermiculite, with some trace additions.  These two ingredients are essential to ensuring a light and airy mixture for seedling roots to move through easily.  

And so, on February 12th I sowed Chinese Kale (hybrid broccoli/kale), Broccoli Rabe, Lupine and Delphinium (these two are perennial flowers).  These were pretty much chosen a random, because my seed collection had grown quite large over the last year and they all took a while to germinate (I have managed to collect about 25-30 seed packs).  Four days later, I ventured into just about every garden center I knew looking for some seed starting trays...needless to say, mid February may be a bit early for these places to be stocking them, I guess.  I did mange to find one place that had some items left over from last season and so I picked up 2 Jiffy Seed Starter Green House kits (each has 72 pods for seeds).

I also grabbed another bag of Country Cottage Seed Starter from that same nursery.  This mix also had sphagnum and vermiculite as the primary ingredients.  On February 16th, I sowed Mortgage Lifter Tomato (an heirloom variety), Swiss Chard, Lavendar, Sweet Basil, Romaine Lettuce, Lolla Rosa, Red Bell Pepper, and Corn (I learned later it was WAY WAY WAY too early to sow tomato and corn...WAY too early).

I was running out of light and so I purchsed a 48" 4 bulbs shop light that utilized t-8 bulbs, as I mentioned earlier...and with that I started my 3rd tray of seeds.  I sowed Corvair Spinach, Razzle Spinach, Super Sweet Cheery Tomato (hybrid cherry), Champion Radish, Parsley, Johnny Jump Up Viola, Shasta Alaska Daisy (both perennial flowers) and Banana Peppers.  

There is tons or information available on the interwebs regarding starting seeds indoors.  Organic Gardening offers a great resource for determining the necessary tools, supplies and seeds for getting a great start indoors...and timing.  Timing is everything!

With a very few exceptions, nearly everything germinated as I had hoped (Delphinium and Razzle Spinach were tougher than expected).  I transplanted nearly all by mid-March and began hardening seedlings like Chinese Kale, Broccoli Rabe, Swiss Chard, Romaine, and Corvair Spinach.  After about a week of letting these specimens get used to the outdoors a bit at a time, I planted all but the spinach.  THEN THE FROST CAME THAT VERY EVENING!  Everything had damage and about half of all planting may be lost!  I had a feeling that it was early, but I grew impatient and paid dearly for it.  

RIP Broccoli Rabe.  :-(

2012 Harvest

Success...and failures

The 2012 growing season was by far my most bountiful...but I did learn a great deal about what to do and what NOT to do in the garden.  I began  sowing seeds in April and I dropped a variety of plants in shortly after that.  This was a late start as direct sowing seeds season is concerned.  In very general terms, the timing of sowing seeds and planting is based on the "frost date" for any given region.  There are a bunch of websites that will give you your average spring and fall frost dates and it is this information that you should use to determine what you plant/sow and when you do it.  Moongardencalendar.com has a "Frost Dates Lookup" where you input your zip code and it will give you the average frost dates for spring and fall.  Almanac.com will do the same and go one step further, they will offer you recommended planting dates, for a variety of common garden plants, based on the frost date in your region.  

My raised bed was looking pretty good by early May with a variety of plants and sown seeds doing their thing.

Starting from the top left and going down rows, there was pac choi (directly sown), Chinese broccoli (directly sown), "Bright Lights" Swiss chard (mix of yellow, white, red chard, transplants of milk jug seedlings).

2nd row, mustard greens (directly sown), parsley and sweet and opal basil (direct sown).

3rd row, mixed salad greens (sown way too thick) corvair spinach (direct sown) and a single rosemary plant.

4th row, tomato plant (gift from a friend), a few pea plants (also gift from Shannon, woman of the earth) and a few more tomato plants and a few corn plants (gift from my sons kindergarten class), with some basil (direct sown) in a row at the bottom in front of the tomato plants.

You may notice some yellow flowers at the top and bottom of the garden bed, they are marigolds.  The fragrance of marigolds will keep away a number of non-beneficial insects without scaring away the most beneficial guys that help pollinate and keep your garden in order.  Yes there are good insects and bugs that aerate your soil, pollinate your flowering plants, eat the EVIL insects and just plain chill out with no harm done.  Bugs can be GOOD!

By June, my raised bed was doing pretty well.  Nearly everything I planted was about doubled in size, I was harvesting lots of salad greens...

as a matter of fact they were going so well, I decided that I should build two new, smaller beds and really take advantage of this newly acquired knowledge.  The new raised garden beds were 4' x 4' x 6" (about the size Mel suggests using at Square Foot Gardening).  I Immediately filled them with the same mix of compost and bagged top soil used for the larger bed.  One was sown with half corn plants, eggplant plants, 1 sage plant and 1 bay leaf plant.  The other had a few tomato plants (a gift from a good friend Michael, a Teresa Caffe friend), 1 tomatillo plant (also gift from a Michael), 2 sweet pepper plants, 1 poblano pepper plant and 8 oriental cucumber plants.  

The harvest!

Long story short, the two smaller beds produced moderately well for me.  I got 10 or so tomatoes, 10 or so tomatillos (more info on these later)

, about 2 dozen cucumbers (more than I could handle for the season) a handful of poblano peppers, nearly no sweet peppers.  The other bed gave me 10 or so eggplant, 10 or so sweet corn ears (still not good quality), and plenty of sage and bay leaf.  

Tomatillo

The larger raised bed was obviously where the bounty of the harvest came from.  Plenty of pac choi (both leaves and full heads), spinach, basil, tons of chard, mustard greens, salad greens, and a fair amount of Chinese broccoli leaves.

early Pac Choi

Beautiful specimen of Pac Choi head

Salad Greens being washed (always wash your greens)

Sisk Chard leaves (I thank my cousin Kenny for that naming)

Mustard Greens

Mustard Greens and Chard everywhere but bottom right, Chinese Broccoli leaves

I was really looking forward to my tomato harvest.  I thought that this was my break out year, that I would have so many tomatoes they would be coming out of my ears.  I was going to be canning, making sauce, salsa, pico de gallo, roasted tomatoes, sun dried tomatoes, tomato hats, tomato bags...well you get the picture.  With that type of expectation, the only way to go was down...and down it went.

Cherry Tomatoes up top, mixed Tomato varieties (mostly Heirlooms) and 4 Tomatillos

Don't get my wrong, this was 1 harvest in late July (I believe) and it was pretty impressive, but this was the most plentiful tomato harvest I had.  I gifted some of the larger heirlooms, snacked on plenty of the cherry tomatoes,  and the tomatillos went into a number of sautes I prepared.  I did not have another harvest of this quantity or quality subsequent to this.  Disease and heat dominated the later half of the summer and before long the dreaded black spots invaded just about every inch of my tomato garden. EARLY BLIGHT! (<---click here to see some more info on Early Blight).  If you check out some images of this, you can see what happens.  Heart breaking!   The season ended well over all.  I had a number of fall plantings survive the early part of the winter, pac choi, Chinese broccoli leaves, spinach, and cilantro.  Once the early part of 2013 hit and the heavy frost and snow visited, they were lost...except for the spinach and cilantro.  20 of each plant survived and have been transplanted into a new home this year.  Nature is awesome!

The 2013 season was fast approaching and it was time to begin thinking about my strategy for this coming season.  There was much to plan, much to contemplate and a new raised bed to build.  Until the next post!