Dr. Bubba sent me a neat article about some folks growing cantaloupe in San Angelo.
I made some nice 'loupes this year, but none near 11 pounds. My biggest ones were the size (and shape) of a football, and mighty tasty.
I'm through with them now, though. I pulled the plants Saturday to make way for broccoli. I'm sure reading that will make everyone buy my niece sad.
Showing posts with label garden. Show all posts
Showing posts with label garden. Show all posts
Monday, August 20, 2007
Monday, July 30, 2007
Odds and Ends
Here are some recent pictures I've meant to post.
200 pounds of pumpkin. It just about killed me to drag that cart back up the hill from the garden to the house. There are 12 pumpkins in the cart; I've cooked and frozen five or six, and the rest are still sitting in the cart on the porch.
The pumpkin patch, on harvest day. The vines got pretty ratty before I picked the pumpkins. They have since been cleaned up an thrown into the compost pile.
The inside of a purple tomato. It's just a very deep red, instead of that purply-brown color the outside has.
200 pounds of pumpkin. It just about killed me to drag that cart back up the hill from the garden to the house. There are 12 pumpkins in the cart; I've cooked and frozen five or six, and the rest are still sitting in the cart on the porch.
The pumpkin patch, on harvest day. The vines got pretty ratty before I picked the pumpkins. They have since been cleaned up an thrown into the compost pile.
The inside of a purple tomato. It's just a very deep red, instead of that purply-brown color the outside has.
Sunday, July 29, 2007
Seeds
If any of y'all want seeds from Homestead, Cherokee Purple, or Brandywine tomatoes, let me know. Those plants have been productive, and have high-quality fruit, so I'm saving the seeds.
Both the Cherokee Purples and Brandywines are beefsteak-type tomatoes, with fruit that ranges from large to extra-large; I've picked a couple of tomatoes off each of those plants that are bigger around than a hamburger bun. The brandywines are pinkish-red, with a nice acidity and good flavor. The cherokees have that great purple outside, with a very deep red inside. They are some of the best tasting tomatoes I've ever had. The homesteads are regular sized, with a very good tomato flavor. They are just a nice salad tomato, and they taste like a tomato should. All three of these varieties have lots of meat and very little pulp.
Anyway, if you want some seeds, just let me know.
Both the Cherokee Purples and Brandywines are beefsteak-type tomatoes, with fruit that ranges from large to extra-large; I've picked a couple of tomatoes off each of those plants that are bigger around than a hamburger bun. The brandywines are pinkish-red, with a nice acidity and good flavor. The cherokees have that great purple outside, with a very deep red inside. They are some of the best tasting tomatoes I've ever had. The homesteads are regular sized, with a very good tomato flavor. They are just a nice salad tomato, and they taste like a tomato should. All three of these varieties have lots of meat and very little pulp.
Anyway, if you want some seeds, just let me know.
Tuesday, July 24, 2007
Growing Things
My garden is going stunningly well. In the last few days, I have picked:
Finally, if you are interested in growing babies, you should visit Laura's Cozy Cabin. Ultrasound photos are involved. By the way, we know that one twin is a boy, to be named Walton Lane after my dad and his dad. The other baby was shy, but Laura suspects that it is a boy, too.
- a pound and a half of okra
- two pounds of green beans
- seven cantaloupes
- a little watermelon about the size of a grapefruit
- six and a half pounds of cucumbers
- five pounds of tomatoes, in about six varieties
- twelve pumpkins, weighing a combined 195 pounds. That's right, on Sunday I picked my weight in pumpkins. I'll have pics this weekend--Laura ran off with the camera, so I can't post the photos now.
Finally, if you are interested in growing babies, you should visit Laura's Cozy Cabin. Ultrasound photos are involved. By the way, we know that one twin is a boy, to be named Walton Lane after my dad and his dad. The other baby was shy, but Laura suspects that it is a boy, too.
Friday, July 13, 2007
There's only two things money can't buy....that's true love, and home-grown tomatoes.
Texas singer-songwriter Guy Clark said that in a song about home-grown tomatoes (though that's not Guy singing in the link). Here's what I've picked in the last couple of days:
My favorites are an heirloom variety called "Cherokee Purple." They are as big as baseballs or softballs, don't have much pulp, and taste like heaven. Plus, they look really cool, with green tops and purpley-red bottoms.
We made some pesto the other day (from home-grown basil, of course), and topped it with warm cherry tomatoes. This variety is called "Sweet Millions," and the plants are really producing well.
Sadly, the neighborhood squirrels also like tomatoes. This one kind of survived, but I've thrown several away that weren't so good. I'm taking action to get those little suckers, though. I'll let you know how that goes.
I'm also growing green beans, okra, and Mississippi purple-hulled peas. (I guess I've got a thing for purple vegetables. Maybe because my high school colors were purple and white, or maybe because "purple" veggies are actually Aggie maroon.) Anyway, each of these crops is producing enough to give us a nice meal each week.
Here's the first pumpkin. It weighs 17 pounds, and I've got about a dozen more this size ripening. Interesting garden fact: you should plant pumpkins from mid-May to mid-June, instead of, say, early March before you go snowboarding. You should do that because you'll feel dumb if you pick pumpkins for Independence Day, before the watermelons get ripe. Pumpkins just belong to fall, not to summer. It's still a nice pumpkin, though.
Here's another panorama, with some handsome devil in an Aggie shirt, for scale. The purple tomatoes came from the big, bushy, dark-green plant at the back on the left. That plant likes my soil.
My favorites are an heirloom variety called "Cherokee Purple." They are as big as baseballs or softballs, don't have much pulp, and taste like heaven. Plus, they look really cool, with green tops and purpley-red bottoms.
We made some pesto the other day (from home-grown basil, of course), and topped it with warm cherry tomatoes. This variety is called "Sweet Millions," and the plants are really producing well.
Sadly, the neighborhood squirrels also like tomatoes. This one kind of survived, but I've thrown several away that weren't so good. I'm taking action to get those little suckers, though. I'll let you know how that goes.
I'm also growing green beans, okra, and Mississippi purple-hulled peas. (I guess I've got a thing for purple vegetables. Maybe because my high school colors were purple and white, or maybe because "purple" veggies are actually Aggie maroon.) Anyway, each of these crops is producing enough to give us a nice meal each week.
Here's the first pumpkin. It weighs 17 pounds, and I've got about a dozen more this size ripening. Interesting garden fact: you should plant pumpkins from mid-May to mid-June, instead of, say, early March before you go snowboarding. You should do that because you'll feel dumb if you pick pumpkins for Independence Day, before the watermelons get ripe. Pumpkins just belong to fall, not to summer. It's still a nice pumpkin, though.
Here's another panorama, with some handsome devil in an Aggie shirt, for scale. The purple tomatoes came from the big, bushy, dark-green plant at the back on the left. That plant likes my soil.
Friday, June 29, 2007
Garden Photos
Here are the pictures I promised earlier:
This is me with some tomato plants.
And me, planting those tomatoes. Now, you can't see the ground in this corner of the garden.
Here's Laura helping out.
The strawberry patch, in May. It's about three feet by six feet. Remember how this looks--you'll see this spot again. At the top of the photo is a watermelon plant that had just sprouted.
Some berries. These are soooooo good.
Mulching. I've moved two pickup loads down the hill, and have a third to go.
My peach tree broke because of all the peaches.
Green beans and cucumbers. I haven't gotten any cukes yet. The beans are producing enough for a nice meal for us each week.
Melons--canteloupe in the front, watermelon in the rear, tomatoes on the right. This is the same plant as that tiny thing in the strawberry picture.
Pumpkins. This picture doesn't really do them justice--there are three hills with two are three plants each. The vines are knee deep, and cover about 40% of the garden. In most of that area, the ground is invisible. They are really setting a lot of fruit, and I've got one pumpkin that is about twice as big as a basketball. I don't know what I'll do with all of them. In this photo, you can see some individual vines stretching out from the mass of pumpkin.
This is the same patch from the other side of the garden. The little stuff on the right is the strawberry patch--the pumpkins are trying to take over.
The view from the second story of our house. The bright green leaves on the left are the peach tree; the pumpkin is the big green mass just behind the fence; the beans and cukes are the tall thing on the right; the back row of the garden is tomato plants. I've got about twenty scattered through the garden, pluse about five more volunteer plants in the turkey pen.
If I can stay on top of the mowing, I'll keep you updated with some harvest pictures. I probably can't keep up with the mowing, though--we got NINE INCHES of rain this week.
This is me with some tomato plants.
And me, planting those tomatoes. Now, you can't see the ground in this corner of the garden.
Here's Laura helping out.
The strawberry patch, in May. It's about three feet by six feet. Remember how this looks--you'll see this spot again. At the top of the photo is a watermelon plant that had just sprouted.
Some berries. These are soooooo good.
Mulching. I've moved two pickup loads down the hill, and have a third to go.
My peach tree broke because of all the peaches.
Green beans and cucumbers. I haven't gotten any cukes yet. The beans are producing enough for a nice meal for us each week.
Melons--canteloupe in the front, watermelon in the rear, tomatoes on the right. This is the same plant as that tiny thing in the strawberry picture.
Pumpkins. This picture doesn't really do them justice--there are three hills with two are three plants each. The vines are knee deep, and cover about 40% of the garden. In most of that area, the ground is invisible. They are really setting a lot of fruit, and I've got one pumpkin that is about twice as big as a basketball. I don't know what I'll do with all of them. In this photo, you can see some individual vines stretching out from the mass of pumpkin.
This is the same patch from the other side of the garden. The little stuff on the right is the strawberry patch--the pumpkins are trying to take over.
The view from the second story of our house. The bright green leaves on the left are the peach tree; the pumpkin is the big green mass just behind the fence; the beans and cukes are the tall thing on the right; the back row of the garden is tomato plants. I've got about twenty scattered through the garden, pluse about five more volunteer plants in the turkey pen.
If I can stay on top of the mowing, I'll keep you updated with some harvest pictures. I probably can't keep up with the mowing, though--we got NINE INCHES of rain this week.
Thursday, June 28, 2007
I'm back
Sorry I haven't posted anything in a while--it's been a crazy couple of months. I've been to two weddings (best wishes to all involved), three musicals (Chicago--great show; Wicked--still L's favorite; Spamalot--meh). My dad and I did some light renovation in a bathroom at L's request--new paint, countertop, fixtures, and accessories. I've signed on and twice visited a deer lease in west Texas. I rented a gigantic wood chipper (a Steve Buscemi special--12" intake with a big deisel engine--the kind you see the pros dragging around behind the bobtail trucks). The limiting factors on what it could grind were 1)how fast I could poke stuff into the spout, and 2)how big a log I could lift and jam in there. I ground a pile about 30 feet across and five feet high into three pickup loads of mulch for the garden. I've also moved 2/3 of the mulch from the pile to the garden, and spread about 1/3 onto the garden. I've cleaned out the turkey house, turned the soil in their pen and planted some forage, plugged some leaks in the house, and built good tight doors for the front. I did this because I was expecting some chicks June 5th. Or maybe the alternate date, June 19. Or possibly this week. If they don't come this week, I'll have to call the hatchery to see what the deal is.
Also, after three years of extreme drought, we've had a very wet May and June. We've gotten rain at least once a week, and the best(?) week featured about a foot of rain. That means I've spent lots of time mowing--I've probably averaged four or five hours a week, although it's been unevenly distributed--eight to ten hours one week, followed by none the next. We've gotten about seven inches this week, including five inches on Tuesday.
The big news is actually L's. She's pregnant. With twins. That has been a whole 'nother experience, which I won't recount here. She's thinking about starting her own blog; I'll give you a link when / if she does.
Finally, with all the rain, my garden has been growing. My strawberries have done incredibly well. They put on a few little berries in April (enough for a snack every three or four days). They went nuts in May--we picked a quart every two or three days in mid-May. They've marched gamely on through June, putting out about a pint every three days. We've gotten spoiled with fresh strawberries just coming out our ears for two months. Now, I just need to find some clotted cream....
Our peach tree put on gobs of fruit--so much, in fact, that it broke a huge branch out of the tree a couple of weeks ago. Also, I discovered that the peach life cycle--too hard, perfect, rotten--has about a fifteen minute picking window. The peaches weren't ready last Tuesday; on Saturday, half of them had fallen, and another quarter were rotting on the tree. From the branch-busting load of May, I actually harvested about four pounds of peaches. At least we don't have to chop and freeze a ton of peaches.
As for the rest of the garden, I picked some nice collards and broccoli. I dug fifteen pounds of potatoes from a patch about as big as a desk. I planted a few ("few" = 20 plants, in 11 varieties) tomatoes. I'm also starting to get some okra, green beans, and purple-hull peas. I've got about a dozen pictures to post later.
Also, after three years of extreme drought, we've had a very wet May and June. We've gotten rain at least once a week, and the best(?) week featured about a foot of rain. That means I've spent lots of time mowing--I've probably averaged four or five hours a week, although it's been unevenly distributed--eight to ten hours one week, followed by none the next. We've gotten about seven inches this week, including five inches on Tuesday.
The big news is actually L's. She's pregnant. With twins. That has been a whole 'nother experience, which I won't recount here. She's thinking about starting her own blog; I'll give you a link when / if she does.
Finally, with all the rain, my garden has been growing. My strawberries have done incredibly well. They put on a few little berries in April (enough for a snack every three or four days). They went nuts in May--we picked a quart every two or three days in mid-May. They've marched gamely on through June, putting out about a pint every three days. We've gotten spoiled with fresh strawberries just coming out our ears for two months. Now, I just need to find some clotted cream....
Our peach tree put on gobs of fruit--so much, in fact, that it broke a huge branch out of the tree a couple of weeks ago. Also, I discovered that the peach life cycle--too hard, perfect, rotten--has about a fifteen minute picking window. The peaches weren't ready last Tuesday; on Saturday, half of them had fallen, and another quarter were rotting on the tree. From the branch-busting load of May, I actually harvested about four pounds of peaches. At least we don't have to chop and freeze a ton of peaches.
As for the rest of the garden, I picked some nice collards and broccoli. I dug fifteen pounds of potatoes from a patch about as big as a desk. I planted a few ("few" = 20 plants, in 11 varieties) tomatoes. I'm also starting to get some okra, green beans, and purple-hull peas. I've got about a dozen pictures to post later.
Thursday, April 19, 2007
Organic Gardening How-To
A nice article from an Irish paper describes some organic gardening basics. It's good advice, although I'd add getting a soil test to the list. My garden is never very good (especially broccoli and its relatives), so I've decided to send some dirt to the state lab for a test. If anything interesting comes of the test, I'll keep you informed.
Tuesday, March 06, 2007
Garden Update
I realized today that I haven't talked about anything but meat for a couple of weeks, so I decided to get crazy and talk about the veggies in my garden. I spent a couple of hours a week ago Sunday putting stuff out. I tried hard to space everything appropriately, so maybe I'll get better growth this year.
I set out nine each of broccoli and collard greens. One broccoli plant has been eaten (by a rabbit?), but the rest are still there, and not dying. I also planted seeds for lettuce, radishes, kohlrabi, carrots, and potato slips. I think the lettuce is sprouting now (something is growing about where I put the seeds), and I should see radishes soon, too. Lettuce and radishes have been my best crops the last couple of years, mostly because they produce in a month or so, and they are hard to screw up. Actually, the only way to mess them up is for them to get too hot, and I really can't control the weather, so I expect good results from these two.
I'm not holding my breath for the carrots or potatoes, because they take forever to sprout. It takes three weeks to get carrot seedlings up, and it takes about a month for potato plants to start poking up. We'll just have to see how these things come along.
I enjoy seeing something happen in the garden, even if things happen slowly. Once again, I'm hopeful that I'll get some nice food from the garden. Right now, things are on schedule--the seeds have been planted, and some of them are sprouting. It's a nice time of year to have a garden.
I set out nine each of broccoli and collard greens. One broccoli plant has been eaten (by a rabbit?), but the rest are still there, and not dying. I also planted seeds for lettuce, radishes, kohlrabi, carrots, and potato slips. I think the lettuce is sprouting now (something is growing about where I put the seeds), and I should see radishes soon, too. Lettuce and radishes have been my best crops the last couple of years, mostly because they produce in a month or so, and they are hard to screw up. Actually, the only way to mess them up is for them to get too hot, and I really can't control the weather, so I expect good results from these two.
I'm not holding my breath for the carrots or potatoes, because they take forever to sprout. It takes three weeks to get carrot seedlings up, and it takes about a month for potato plants to start poking up. We'll just have to see how these things come along.
I enjoy seeing something happen in the garden, even if things happen slowly. Once again, I'm hopeful that I'll get some nice food from the garden. Right now, things are on schedule--the seeds have been planted, and some of them are sprouting. It's a nice time of year to have a garden.
Thursday, February 22, 2007
More garden stuff
The hardest part about gardening, for me, is thinning. I just can't bring myself to get rid of those cute little sprouts. Of course, not getting rid of the sprouts means that, in about a month, I'll have a bunch of scrawny, ugly plants jammed together. I think that's why I don't get better results.
Tonight I went out and bought some broccoli and collard greens. Each of those vegetables will get a three foot X six foot plot in the garden--eighteen square feet.
I bought nine of each plant. Just nine--this way, each plant will (I hope) have room to spread out and grow nice and big, and provide me with some tasty treats (or at least some strongly-flavored green stuff. I know that neither broccoli or collards are universally loved.)
Tonight I went out and bought some broccoli and collard greens. Each of those vegetables will get a three foot X six foot plot in the garden--eighteen square feet.
I bought nine of each plant. Just nine--this way, each plant will (I hope) have room to spread out and grow nice and big, and provide me with some tasty treats (or at least some strongly-flavored green stuff. I know that neither broccoli or collards are universally loved.)
Tuesday, February 20, 2007
Garden time
We've had nice weather here the last few days--today it was almost 80--and I've been getting the garden ready. I've cleared out the dead stuff from last year (actually, I just dropped the mower as low as it will go and ground that stuff into mulch), and I've put down fresh compost over my planting beds. I just need to put some fresh bark mulch in my walkways, and my garden will be ready. This is my favorite time of the garden year; my garden is neat and tidy, with fresh, dark compost in the beds set against the light mulch of the walkways. The dead plants are gone, and the weeds haven't come up. I'm still planning what to plant this year and dreaming of what it will look like. My garden is peaceful and clean, and I'm hopeful that I'll grow some good stuff.
Unfortunately, I'm much better at cleaning and tidying than I am at getting plants to grow. In two years, I've gotten half a dozen big tomatoes, two bowls of black-eyed peas, and no corn--not one ear. I did make a pumpkin vine that was about thirty yards long last year, but all it produced was a pair of volleyball-sized pumpkins, one of which grew with a big cone-shaped dent in the side. I always hope for a wonderful garden full of fresh veggies, so that I can come home from work and just pick some stuff for dinner. Sadly, I wind up going to the store for produce most of the summer.
Oh well--I'm hopeful that this year will be different, and that's why this is my favorite time of the garden year.
Unfortunately, I'm much better at cleaning and tidying than I am at getting plants to grow. In two years, I've gotten half a dozen big tomatoes, two bowls of black-eyed peas, and no corn--not one ear. I did make a pumpkin vine that was about thirty yards long last year, but all it produced was a pair of volleyball-sized pumpkins, one of which grew with a big cone-shaped dent in the side. I always hope for a wonderful garden full of fresh veggies, so that I can come home from work and just pick some stuff for dinner. Sadly, I wind up going to the store for produce most of the summer.
Oh well--I'm hopeful that this year will be different, and that's why this is my favorite time of the garden year.
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