Bomb Cyclone!

Just in time for Christmas, Mother Nature delivered winter with a vengeance. An historic winter storm and arctic blast descended upon a vast majority of the continental United States last Friday, December 23rd, effecting holiday travel and leaving many folks without power. Indeed, our power was out for 18 hours due to downed trees and power lines! With big winds and plummeting temperatures expected, I was worried about my little garden. Could my winter-hardy plants survive temperatures in the single digits? made worse by the crazy winds?

Before the power and my internet went out, I found this very informative article about winter kill temperatures of cold hardy vegetables by Pam Dawling, who writes a blog called Sustainable Market Farming from her place in central Virginia. After reading her data I decided to harvest all the nicely developed rosettes of pak choi, pick the biggest leaves of the beautiful collards (morris heading and georgia southern varieties), thin the kale, then securely cover all the main beds with lightweight fabric row cover. The herbs and the garlic remained uncovered. With fingers crossed, I hoped for the best.

When we woke up on December 24th, the thermometer read 9 degrees (F). Compare that to one of our not-so-unusual December days, like today, for example ... 32 degrees when we woke up and a very nice 62 degrees this afternoon! Anyway, here's what happened in the garden on that frigidly cold night:

• The hakurei turnips and hen-pecked mustard greens were most damaged, showing dead and dying foliage. Even the globe of the turnip roots had frozen.
• The nevada lettuce plants got knocked back pretty hard. I wonder ... might some recover?
• The large outer leaves of the cabbage plants were definitely cold hurt, but the heads should continue to develop.
• The kale bed had limited damage. Most of the leaves are still quite healthy looking.
• The collards show very mild damage to a few leaves, but overall, they look great.
• The dark green Bloomsdale spinach is perfect, and so sweet!
• The garlic is keeping on.
• The cilantro (first time in my winter garden) is gorgeous!
• Other herbs fared quite well, including the rosemary, lavendar, thyme, sage, and oregano. The sorrel got a bit nipped but should recover. 

Photo Gallery of the aftermath:

top to bottom: mustard greens, caribe cilantro, hakurei turnips

cabbage with damaged outer leaves

recently cut collards with mild discoloration on a few leaves

lovely spinach and damaged lettuce

kale with white discoloration from cold-hurt

garlic - hanging in there!

Garlic

Our friends from Seattle brought us garlic bulbs. They are settled into the garden now, where they will grow all winter and into the spring. Then ... fresh garlic!

Lorz Italian softneck

Duganski hardneck

Inchelium Red softneck

Hurrican Ian

Forecasters say we could get as much as 5" rain in NC ... fingers crossed!

Localized drought at our house. The rain clouds just seem to avoid us.

Late summer garden produce

 

Figs, sautéd in butter, on top of french toast

okra, beans, cherry tomatoes, peppers

okra, 2nd crop green beans, cherry tomatoes

Serendipity ... the yuck bucket squashes

roasted shishito peppers and delicata squash

Autumnal Equinox

It's the first day of fall! The day we experience equal amounts of daylight and darkness. This year, in 2022, the official moment occurs at 9:04 pm ET.

The energy of summer has come to an end. For gardeners, it's time to harvest the last of the summer crops, pick the apples and pears, plant the winter garden. On a deeper level, it's time to take stock and "harvest" the efforts and intentions set earlier in the year.

Here's a nice read about the spiritual significance of the autumn season.

Planting Day

Oh, boy! I finally got everything into the ground.

Hmmm ... This might be the earliest I've ever established my fall / winter garden.

Grow, plants, grow!

Thinking about the fall / winter garden...

It's a good start!

I bought some plants:

• collards - morris heading, georgia southern
• Cabbabe - savoy
• pak choi

I bought some seeds:

• kale - red russian, lacinato, siberian
• nevada lettuce
• mustard (hen-pecked)
• turnips (hakurei)
• spinach (dark green bloomsdale)

I have some seeds on hand:

• Caribe Cilantro
• Arugula (rocket)
• Dwarf blue curled scotch kale

Pears and Apples

 Fruit!

Our apple tree produced fruit for the first time ever, and the pear tree is loaded!

Gala Apples look like ornaments hanging from the tree

So many pears!

They look like garlands weighting down the tree!

We love eating apples and pears, sliced thinly, along with a nice aged cheddar or a creamy blue cheese.

Lots of "Yuck Bucket" Squash Growing in the Garden

"Yuck Bucket" is what we call the can we use to collect kitchen scraps to throw on the compost pile. Sometimes a few of the seeds don't get sufficiently composted before being spread onto the garden beds, resulting in serendipitous plantings about the garden. This year we had a bounty of 'surprise' squash plants. Here is the fruit of one such vine:

Lovely to look at. Reminds one of "delicata" squash. But the skin is HARD... very difficult to cut. I roasted them anyway, and served them to the family. FAIL! Granddaughter E said the flesh tasted like VELCRO!! 😂

Okra is not thriving...

 In fact, some plants have died. What's going on?

I pulled up one of the dead plants to find root nematodes.

Not a pretty sight!

Here's what I found at:  Okra Root Knot Nematodes

"Root knot nematodes are tiny eelworms that live in the soil and become plant parasites when they use okra roots as their nurseries. Often nematodes enter okra roots through small injuries. As their numbers muliply, small feeder roots are destroyed, and irregular galls take their place." 

Well ... that's just great!

A bit early to harvest the winter squash, but ...

We haven't had enough rain. The winter squash vines are drying up. I hope the fruit is ripe enough. No matter, they must be picked.

In the foreground: candy roaster squash, seeds from son Andrew

The stripey squash behind that: delicata, also seeds from son Andrew

The big yellow ones: spaghetti squash, volunteered from compost

Sweet 100's cherry tomatoes, a couple of Rouse's traditional tomatoes, jade green beans in the back

Cherry-Type Tomato

This is a large oblong cherry tomato. Sturdy, not too juicy, very flavorful. So sweet when roasted! Too bad I can't remember the actual variety! 🙄 

 

BLT

First BLT of the season.

First delicious tomato (outside cherry tomatoes) that we've ever had!

Seriously, I have given up on a traditional tomato crop in our garden space. But Rouse the Spouse insists on planting and hoping for a bona-fide home-grown tomato. Finally, this year, he got his wish!

 PS: Yeah ... that's Duke's mayonnaise 😄

Basil PEST-o

I processed a big batch of basic basil and garlic pesto to be frozen for future use. These critters managed to sneak into the house on the basil leaves. Yellow and spiny, about 1/2" long... the larval stage of the Mexican Bean Beetle. They prefer bean leaves, but will obviously snack upon other crops as well.

more info here:

https://entnemdept.ufl.edu/creatures/veg/bean/mexican_bean_beetle.htm 

Finding Fingerlings

I did the initial "digging" of potatoes this morning. Actually, the way I plant them in a "lazy bed" under deep cover of collected leaves, there's not much digging involved. I remove the spent plants, swipe away the leaves and ... voila! Easily accessible buried treasure.

Once I gathered up the obvious tubers, I sifted through the soil with gloved hands. This morning I came up with 9-1/2 pounds of French Fingerlings. We'll use a turning fork later to get at the ones that have settled deeper into the dirt.

AND we'll go after the German Butterballs another day. By the time I finished collecting the fingerlings, there was too much sun exposure at that end of the bed!

'tis the season ...

Blueberries for Queen Betty's birthday cake. Tomatoes for salads and sandwiches. A couple of figs. Hope you like green beans! And what to do with all those cucumbers?!

Refrigerator pickles are a summertime treat. We keep one big jar each of sweet slices and garlic dill spears.

Tzatziki, made with grated cucumbers and garlic, thick greek yogurt, lemon juice, olive oil, salt, mint.

Cherry Tomatoes

Summer Crops Arrive

The garden was in full swing when we arrived home from vacation. Our son, Andrew, had done what he could to manage the bounty while we were away... watering, tidying, picking, eating, and giving away the produce. Still, plenty to welcome us back!

The blueberries were plump in their ripeness. We picked 5-1/2 pounds right away! with plenty more to come. We ate our fill and got started on the cache of frozen berries that will carry us through the winter. The wineberries looked a bit over-ripe, but in reality were perfect! They will be cooked down into beautiful sweet jam.

Many of the rattlesnake beans looked stressed, with pods not nearly as plump as one would expect. I'm guessing this was related to dry conditions at the critical time of growth. Indeed, upon experimentation in the kitchen I found these beans to be too starchy for my taste.

Still, I managed to pick 8 pounds of delicious, well-formed rattlesnake pole beans! Notice the difference.

Alas, no picture of the Jade bush beans, but I did pick 3 pounds of them. A funny thing happened to the bush bean bed. It was overtaken by a volunteer squash! Thankfully, Andrew pushed the trailing vines away from the bean plants. It looks like it's going to be a monster gourd plant ... time will tell.

We have a bunch of serendipitous squash plants throughout the garden. They're little surprises from the obviously not-fully-composted compost pile. I let them grow, waiting to see what would come of them. So far I like what I see. Here's a sample of what's volunteering this year:

Delicata and Acorn squash

Spaguetti Squash?

The cucumber trellis is working very well. Look at these picture-perfect cucumbers!

The sweet Italian frying pepper plants are loaded!

A pile of produce! Let the summer feast begin!!

Home Again

We are back from our arctic travels. We saw lovely forests in Norway, but we sure did miss trees and plants while exploring Svalbard! We traveled as far north as 80 degrees 36 minutes north. Now THAT truly feels like the edge of the world. Wow!

Lupine - Gardermoen, Norway

Saxafrage - Svalbard

Arctic Landscape - Svalbard

Navigating the pack ice, heading for 80 degrees 36 minutes North

cucumbers

Beets on the Menu Tonight

The beet roots are pushing themselves out of the ground! I guess it's time to harvest the biggest ones. Plus, I haven't been good at thinning the plants this season. I'll be sure to pull some of the nicest fresh-green tops. The roots will go into the pressure pot for 15 minutes, then peeled, sliced and treated with a sweet-sour glaze, ala Harvard Beets. The greens will be sautéd ... maybe in some tasty bacon grease? and splashed with some vinegar? The cook will follow her nose - and taste buds!

Memorial Day - Black Raspberries at their Peak

I've been picking a handful... a cupful... a bowlful of berries every morning or so over the past couple of weeks. This morning I picked two quarts!

We've been snacking on raspberries out-of-hand and embellishing our morning cereal. Over the weekend I cooked down a batch with a dose of honey to make a berry compote that I used to enhance Susanna's birthday cake. My next project will be our favorite raspberry cobbler recipe... 

Raspberry Roll

Pastry

2 cups sifted flour

2 teaspoons sugar

1 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup butter, softened

1 egg, beaten

~1/4 cup milk

Sift together dry ingredients; cut in butter until mixture resembles coarse corn meal. Add egg and enough milk to make a soft dough. Stir gently with fork until mixture holds together. Press into a smooth ball. Divide dough in half; cover and set aside.

Filling

1 cup sugar (or 1/4 cup sugar per cup of berries used)

2 tablespoons flour

4 cups fresh berries (can use as few as 3 cups)

1/2 cup butter, divided

3/4 - 1 cup water

2 tablespoons sugar

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Grease 13"x 9" x2" baking dish. Carefully fold sugar and 2 tablespoons flour into berries. Roll out half the dough into a 14" x 10" rectangle. Cover with half the berries, spreading them within 2" of the edge. Dot with half the butter. Roll up jelly-roll fashion, folding ends under. Place in prepared dish. Repeat. Cut slits in top of each roll. Pour water into dish around rolls. Sprinkle with 2 tablespoons sugar. Bake ~ 60 minutes until golden brown and bubbly.

Favorite Lettuce Ever Grown

We've had a wonderful long, cool, rainy spring. It's the first time I've had true success growing lettuce from seed in the spring. And I've discovered my all-time favorite garden lettuce!

Nevada Lettuce from High Mowing organic seeds

From the seed pack: "Heat tolerant Batavian type with shiny green leaves forming a heavy head. Ribs are crunchy like an iceburg while the leaves are soft like a leaf lettuce."

I couldn't have said it better myself!

Interesting how the ribs are growing in a spiral.

Potatoes Blooming

 

Temperatures to reach 89 degrees today...

Sugar Snap Peas

Beetle damage on salad turnip tops. The roots are fine. Harvested all remaining.

Took  my coffee to the garden and picked in the coolness of the morning.
The lettuce and cilantro will not like the coming hot temps!