Each year we try some new gardening methods and plant varieties in our vegetable garden. One of the methods we are using is the “no-till” method. Normally we would hire a friend to come out and till our soil. At the same time we would amend the soil with organic turkey fertilizer. There is a cost to tilling, and the turkey fertilizer was not cheap either. Repeated tilling will eventually cause soil compaction. It also disturbs the beneficial critters in the soil that help break down organic matter into even better soil. We decided that our gardens are not so huge that we couldn’t aerate the soil by hand. We are fortunate to have a friend who is a welder, and he was able to build us broad forks in trade for some artwork. The broad fork looks like a stout potato fork with two handles. You simply push the broad fork into the soil (I have to stand on it sometimes) and pull it back with both handles to loosen the soil. By loosening the soil, rather than tilling we maintain the biological structure of the soil and help build a better environment for the beneficial critters like worms and microbes. Broad forking is great exercise and requires no gas or machine maintenance.
The drawback of no-till is that you can get a lot of weeds.
I tried not weeding. Really, I didn’t weed…much. What I did do, was plant buckwheat as a cover crop. Buckwheat is fantastic. It grows very quickly and is very easy to pull up. I planted it in between the rows and around the edges of the garden. It quickly takes over where weeds would’ve filled in. When it just started to blossom I’d let the bees at it for a couple days and then pull it up and drop it around my plants for mulch. Buckwheat has a hollow tubular stem and breaks down very quickly as compost, adding nutrients to your soil. I also use a fair amount of straw as mulch. I always mulch my tomatoes, and strawberries. In the past I’d spread straw around most of the other plants in my garden, but this year I let the buckwheat do the trick. I thought I was pretty smart with this Buckwheat method, and for the most part it worked well. But we also applied a four inch layer of well seasoned manure. It produced a lot new weeds! I’m glad we added the manure, because I think it really helped our yield. But we had a lot of Clover, Creeping Charlie, Lambs Quarter, and Purslane. I know that some folks eat Purslane and Lambs Quarter; I just haven’t acquired a taste for it…yet. I don’t mind pulling some of these weeds, but Clover and Creeping Charlie are very difficult to pull. Next year I’m going to try much heavier layers of mulch. Some folks layer their mulch like lasagna. I think I’ll try shredding newspaper and white paper, layer it around where I’ve planted, soak it well, top it with a layer of compost, and finally add a layer of straw. I’ll plant the buckwheat in between the rows and all around the garden. I think I’m just going to relax and learn to work with the weeds, they don’t seem to inhibit our yield, we have never had so many peas. We had huge cabbages, zucchini coming out of our ears, and more cucumbers than we could keep up with (thus the 40 jars of pickles in the basement) All in all, this year was a garden success, but there’s always something new to try.
Showing posts with label garden. Show all posts
Showing posts with label garden. Show all posts
Friday, December 25, 2009
Growing Fruit in Zone 3
This year we added some new fruits to our garden. I planted red and black currents from bare root plants. I don’t think I’ll see fruit on those for a couple of years. In the future I might spend a bit more for fully mature plants, as you will see fruit in less time. Currants are considered the easiest fruit for a novice to grow. I like that, something I can stick in the ground without a lot of fuss. Currents are highly nutritious and will make nice juice for jelly. We also added blueberries. We amended the soil with peat moss for acidity, and some sand for drainage. We mulched with pine bark, also very acidic. Blueberries need some fussing. You have to have good acidic soil with good drainage. We did get a few berries, nothing to crow about yet, but hopefully in a year or two we will be able to add preserved blueberries to our pantry.
We expanded our strawberry patch to include June bearing strawberries. These require that you train the plants into alternating rows. Each year you discard the plants that bore fruit and keep the new plants that you trained to grow off to one side. I don’t think we have our bed configured properly for this purpose. We are going to have to move the new plants to another bed in the spring. I notice a distinct difference between June bearing and Everbearing Strawberries. The June bearing strawberries have a lot more flavor, but they are small and very delicate. Also, as their name indicates, they bear fruit in only in early summer. The Everbearing variety produce very large strawberries, much like the “store bought” type. They are not as sweet, but the make dynamite jam and preserves, and they produce a LOT of fruit. We picked at least a pint a day for much of the summer, and in mid-summer I picked two pints on most days, I was still picking strawberries into October. I have 50 Everbearing plants, and from those we canned 50 jars of strawberry jam and preserves, froze 9 quarts of whole berries and ate strawberries almost daily. I do fuss over my strawberries. I make sure that the bed is weed free and mulched. We top dressed the plants with fertilizer in the spring and sprinkled a handful of manure around each plant in July. The plants really responded to the manure. I also make sure that I clip all of the new baby “sucker” plants as they emerge. You must clip all of the suckers in order to let the plant put energy into making fruit. Everbearing strawberry plants last about 3-4 years before they begin to slow down in yield. You then replace them with new plants. I’m also a big advocate of regular watering. I take note of when it rains and when it’s dry. I make sure that my garden gets an inch of water each week, and it is best if it’s from rain.
My husband is very handy, and built a frame for berry netting. It’s simply che
ap pvc pipe configured like a cube over the garden. We hung netting on top and around the sides, leaving a space for us to enter. The birds, deer, chipmunks, and squirrels have been kept out so far! Deer will eat the plants right down to the dirt. They took quite a few of my Junebearing plants because we didn’t have them covered.
All the work is really worth it, we opened a jar of strawberry marmalade this morning...heaven on a waffle!
We expanded our strawberry patch to include June bearing strawberries. These require that you train the plants into alternating rows. Each year you discard the plants that bore fruit and keep the new plants that you trained to grow off to one side. I don’t think we have our bed configured properly for this purpose. We are going to have to move the new plants to another bed in the spring. I notice a distinct difference between June bearing and Everbearing Strawberries. The June bearing strawberries have a lot more flavor, but they are small and very delicate. Also, as their name indicates, they bear fruit in only in early summer. The Everbearing variety produce very large strawberries, much like the “store bought” type. They are not as sweet, but the make dynamite jam and preserves, and they produce a LOT of fruit. We picked at least a pint a day for much of the summer, and in mid-summer I picked two pints on most days, I was still picking strawberries into October. I have 50 Everbearing plants, and from those we canned 50 jars of strawberry jam and preserves, froze 9 quarts of whole berries and ate strawberries almost daily. I do fuss over my strawberries. I make sure that the bed is weed free and mulched. We top dressed the plants with fertilizer in the spring and sprinkled a handful of manure around each plant in July. The plants really responded to the manure. I also make sure that I clip all of the new baby “sucker” plants as they emerge. You must clip all of the suckers in order to let the plant put energy into making fruit. Everbearing strawberry plants last about 3-4 years before they begin to slow down in yield. You then replace them with new plants. I’m also a big advocate of regular watering. I take note of when it rains and when it’s dry. I make sure that my garden gets an inch of water each week, and it is best if it’s from rain.
My husband is very handy, and built a frame for berry netting. It’s simply che
ap pvc pipe configured like a cube over the garden. We hung netting on top and around the sides, leaving a space for us to enter. The birds, deer, chipmunks, and squirrels have been kept out so far! Deer will eat the plants right down to the dirt. They took quite a few of my Junebearing plants because we didn’t have them covered.All the work is really worth it, we opened a jar of strawberry marmalade this morning...heaven on a waffle!
Deer Deer Deer
Deer…dear deer, at least I used to think so. This year the deer were not nice to us. They pillaged our gardens on a daily basis. They became a nuisance early on, ignoring our shouts and chomping away on those lovely zucchini blossoms. This was the first year that we tried eating zucchini blossoms. I baked them into a frittata and they were delicious! I had planned on trying some stuffed with cheese, battered and fried. The deer decided that they should have them instead.
I do like watching deer. Fifteen years ago when we moved into this house, we set out food so we could watch them. I guess that so many years of living in Saint Paul and not seeing much wildlife got the best of our common sense. The deer became quite tame, coming in for apples and carrots, showing off their babies. What fun it is to watch fawns play and cavort out in your yard! We’d watch them racing around and around the house…what a hoot!
When we started vegetable gardening I always planted more than we needed. I’d say to the deer, “You can have some, but don’t take it all.” There were days that I’d be four feet from a buck, he’d be contentedly nibbling around the edge of my garden, but he’d never venture into the middle, even when I was watching from the house. This went on for well over ten years. The deer would stay out of the middle of my garden and eat around the edges. Everyone was happy. I do use “Liquid Fence” quite liberally as insurance. I got into the habit of putting bamboo stakes down either side of my rows of beans, and suspending netting over the top. The deer weren’t able to control the temptation of green beans, so I learned to protect them. I also use predator tape, which is a mylar ribbon that you attach to poles and place around the garden. It works well in the spring but the deer seem to get used to it.
This year we had several does that would trounce right into the middle of the garden like it was planted for them. They ripped down deer netting, crashed through fencing and basically just ate anything they could reach. We lost a lot of squash, they ate whole squash! Not just little bites. Then they ate the leaves off of everything except the potatoes and cucumbers. They ate zucchinis and squash blossoms, pumpkins, beans, beet greens, carrot greens, lettuce, broccoli, beans, strawberries, strawberry plants, and peas. They took bites out of a lot of tomatoes, ruining them in the process.
I think I’m paying for all my years of gloating. People would ask me, “Do you have a deer fence?” I’d reply, “No, I plant enough for the deer too. They never take too much, we coexist.” Now I’m asking myself, “Bigger garden or beefier fences?” I have resorted to a slingshot and small pebbles. But that doesn’t help when I’m not at home. I’ve also said to the deer, “Keep eating! I’ll get my veggies from you in the fall!” Only problem is that we are in the city limits, and I can’t shoot ‘em. So, we are researching an electric fence. I’m tired of sharing, and they aren’t giving enough back.
I do like watching deer. Fifteen years ago when we moved into this house, we set out food so we could watch them. I guess that so many years of living in Saint Paul and not seeing much wildlife got the best of our common sense. The deer became quite tame, coming in for apples and carrots, showing off their babies. What fun it is to watch fawns play and cavort out in your yard! We’d watch them racing around and around the house…what a hoot!
When we started vegetable gardening I always planted more than we needed. I’d say to the deer, “You can have some, but don’t take it all.” There were days that I’d be four feet from a buck, he’d be contentedly nibbling around the edge of my garden, but he’d never venture into the middle, even when I was watching from the house. This went on for well over ten years. The deer would stay out of the middle of my garden and eat around the edges. Everyone was happy. I do use “Liquid Fence” quite liberally as insurance. I got into the habit of putting bamboo stakes down either side of my rows of beans, and suspending netting over the top. The deer weren’t able to control the temptation of green beans, so I learned to protect them. I also use predator tape, which is a mylar ribbon that you attach to poles and place around the garden. It works well in the spring but the deer seem to get used to it.
This year we had several does that would trounce right into the middle of the garden like it was planted for them. They ripped down deer netting, crashed through fencing and basically just ate anything they could reach. We lost a lot of squash, they ate whole squash! Not just little bites. Then they ate the leaves off of everything except the potatoes and cucumbers. They ate zucchinis and squash blossoms, pumpkins, beans, beet greens, carrot greens, lettuce, broccoli, beans, strawberries, strawberry plants, and peas. They took bites out of a lot of tomatoes, ruining them in the process.
I think I’m paying for all my years of gloating. People would ask me, “Do you have a deer fence?” I’d reply, “No, I plant enough for the deer too. They never take too much, we coexist.” Now I’m asking myself, “Bigger garden or beefier fences?” I have resorted to a slingshot and small pebbles. But that doesn’t help when I’m not at home. I’ve also said to the deer, “Keep eating! I’ll get my veggies from you in the fall!” Only problem is that we are in the city limits, and I can’t shoot ‘em. So, we are researching an electric fence. I’m tired of sharing, and they aren’t giving enough back.
Summer in a Canning jar
We have two very large vegetable gardens, two strawberry patches, raspberries, currants, blueberries, and rhubarb. Because of this, I spend a lot of time in the kitchen canning in late summer. It's very rewarding to go down into the root cellar and see shelves full of jars. To me those jars are summer. Each and every one is precious, I love opening them throughout the winter and tasting how wonderfully good home made preserves, veggies and pickles can be.
This year we made a lot of pickles, hot pickles, sweet pickles, curried pickles, bread and butter pickles, and pickled green beans. We're famous among our friends at parties for those green beans!
We just finished a batch of german red cabbage. We made this last year and when I tried some right out of the jar, I didn't like it. Then just last week I took out a jar and heated it...wow! It was better than any red cabbage I'd had in a restaurant. So, that solved the problem of "what do we do with all the red cabbages in the garden?"
We had trouble with tomatoes. They didn't ripen. So they're in boxes and ripening slowly. Every few days I get enough to make a few cups of sauced tomatoes for the freezer or a batch of salsa. If you grow tomatoes and do not have a Back to Basics Food Strainer and Sauce Maker...get one! I got mine at Ace Hardware. It looks like an old fashioned meat grinder with a big bowl on top. you wash the tomatoes, cut them in large chunks and grind them. The seed, skin, and core come out one end and you have nice tomato pulp out the other end. Gone are the days of me blanching tomatoes, dropping them into ice water, peeling, coring and seeding. Ugh! It is a nice quick way to process tomatoes for salsa.
We also bought a Mehu Maija steamer on Ebay. They are available at Amazon and Ebay, but I haven't ever found one locally. It's a Finnish invention that allows you to steam whole fruits in the top, and extract the juice via a tube at the bottom. No more cooking apples, running them through the ricer, then squeezing the pulp through a jelly bag! This baby made quick work of 5lbs of wild plums. We just put them in the top, set the top onto the pan of boiling water and let it simmer for 90 minutes. You then open the valve on the tube and fill jars with beautiful clear juice, ready to be canned or made into jelly. I'm looking forward to trying it on berries next year.
This year we made a lot of pickles, hot pickles, sweet pickles, curried pickles, bread and butter pickles, and pickled green beans. We're famous among our friends at parties for those green beans!
We just finished a batch of german red cabbage. We made this last year and when I tried some right out of the jar, I didn't like it. Then just last week I took out a jar and heated it...wow! It was better than any red cabbage I'd had in a restaurant. So, that solved the problem of "what do we do with all the red cabbages in the garden?"
We had trouble with tomatoes. They didn't ripen. So they're in boxes and ripening slowly. Every few days I get enough to make a few cups of sauced tomatoes for the freezer or a batch of salsa. If you grow tomatoes and do not have a Back to Basics Food Strainer and Sauce Maker...get one! I got mine at Ace Hardware. It looks like an old fashioned meat grinder with a big bowl on top. you wash the tomatoes, cut them in large chunks and grind them. The seed, skin, and core come out one end and you have nice tomato pulp out the other end. Gone are the days of me blanching tomatoes, dropping them into ice water, peeling, coring and seeding. Ugh! It is a nice quick way to process tomatoes for salsa.
We also bought a Mehu Maija steamer on Ebay. They are available at Amazon and Ebay, but I haven't ever found one locally. It's a Finnish invention that allows you to steam whole fruits in the top, and extract the juice via a tube at the bottom. No more cooking apples, running them through the ricer, then squeezing the pulp through a jelly bag! This baby made quick work of 5lbs of wild plums. We just put them in the top, set the top onto the pan of boiling water and let it simmer for 90 minutes. You then open the valve on the tube and fill jars with beautiful clear juice, ready to be canned or made into jelly. I'm looking forward to trying it on berries next year.
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