End of the year status

Surgery the day after Thanksgiving, to have my appendix out, slowed me down for a few weeks.

Tom did set up my Christmas present early. The composter shown is the photo below. It is called the Earthmaker and completely self contained. Right now it is sitting on our patio as we have not yet decided on a permanent location.


Before we left for Utah I started to compost.
I had been saving some kitchen scraps for awhile and decided to go ahead and start loading the top section. Got some grass cutting from my neighbor to cover the food.



Also added some shredded paper and leaves. Didn't add any water as we were going out of town and I just wanted to let it sit.

This is how it looks today. Yesterday I had added a lot of scraps , leaves and the remains of the plants that got zapped by the frost we had late last week. Also added moisture which should help everything to start to decompose faster.

These two photos show how we tried to protect the trees and garden from the frosts on December 26th through the 28th. The trees came through fine but some of the plants were hit too hard to survive. Pulled out all the tomato plants and saved the larger tomatoes. Maybe I'll make some green tomato salsa. All the squash plants bit the dust. What I really wanted to protect was the strawberry patch. Looks good so far, as do all the root vegetables.

You know it was cold when the bird bath freezes over.

Happy New Year!

Box added

Went to my favorite nursery Tuesday the 18th as they had a big sale going on. Bought seeds for spring planting, some herbs and a tray of swiss chard transplants. Took the netting off the boxes to make it easier to water and tend the garden.

These next few photos show the empty square where all the radishes were harvested. I loosened the soil, added two trowels of mixed compost, then worked it into the soil.

Next I planted the chard and then put some shade over it as we were still having very warm weather. Today, Nov. 26th, is cold and rain started this morning.

We had this nice open area by the orange tree, and I thought this would make a nice herb garden, so Tom built me a new box that is 2 by 4 feet which fit the space perfectly.

Here he is measuring and leveling, then filling and putting gravel over the weed barrier that was laid under the box. Read more about growing herbs and have decided to plant them in pots instead, so this box will remain empty until spring planting.

Finally got around to finishing the path along side the strawberry patch. The strawberries are growing nicely. Had a berry turning red, but a bird got to before I did so I have covered the other plant that has a few berries on it.

Finally, a couple of cherry tomatoes are forming on the plant in the hanging basket. The plants don't seem to like hanging as they are trying to grow upward. Next time I'll plant indeterminate tomatoes in the basket as they will hang down.

Won't be here for a couple of weeks, so Kristy will be watering and harvesting anything that is ripe. So far, we've had lots of lettuce and several batches of chard, radishes, bell peppers, bok choy, and chives. Lots of tomatoes have set but none are ripe yet.

P.S. Harvested 8 pea pods, some bok choy and our first reasonably sized summer squash and used them in a stir fry for dinner tonight. Really fresh and tasty.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!

Six week update - part 1

Nancy came to Phoenix to visit for a week, so didn't do anything in the garden except water and watch things grow.

Some squares needed thinning, some needed harvesting, and others needed managing. So I ended up spending about three hours tending the garden this morning. The first photo was taken about 8:30 a.m. so there was a lot of shade. The right photo shows the growth of all that was planted September 24th or shortly thereafter. Everything has grown well.

Left photo is the second box which was planted one to two weeks later. On the right is the third box of squares where all the transplants are doing well and in the foreground are the seeds that were planted two weeks ago, also if you click on the photo to make it larger you can see the garlic coming up on both sides of the chives. I just bought a clove of garlic at the grocery store, broke it apart and planted the pieces and they grew.

It's always fun to go out and just look. On the left you can see how much the Early Girl tomato has grown. We now have small tomatoes on the Roma plant and the Cherry tomato plants. In the right photo you can see the first pea pod and some blossoms.

Besides the hot peppers which came with the transplant, more peppers are forming on the other plants. Also, you can see the first blossom on the summer squash transplants. We had to look closely to find the small squash that is on the same plant as the blossom. Click on right photo.

Just a few more views of other plants. Artichokes on the left and more summer squash on the right (looks like lots of little squash are about ready to form on these two).

Lots of blossoms on the hanging tomatoes but none formed yet. On the right is a very healthy looking strawberry patch. Please look at six week update continued below.

Six week update- part 2

Picked the last three radishes from the original square planted and now we have our first square ready for a second crop. Just have to trowel in a scoop of a mix of good composts and replant.











Did some harvesting today. On the left is the swiss chard square before cutting and on the right is the colander full of chard and the plants behind. We'll have this fresh chard for dinner tonight.











Also harvested a colander full of salad greens. Cut off of five different types of salad greens. Bought a salad spinner last week so it would be easier to wash the fresh greens. The photo on the right is of everything that was harvested.

The bush beans were flopping over into the adjacent squares, so to solve that problem I asked Tom to cut some 2 foot tall stakes for me. I had bought some embroidery hoops and netting when we had the cabbage worm problem but I guess the egg shells worked, so I separated the hoops, put one over the plants, inserted the stakes and twist tied the hoop up about 6 inches. As the plants grow I'll add another hoop or simply raise the existing one higher. I also hooped the hot peppers. Left photo is the bush beans.

Read somewhere on the internet that to get longer white scallions you should cover them with more mix as they grow. Since they were already at box top level, Tom made me some 12 inch squares about 2 1/2 inches high and I just laid them on the existing squares and then added more "Mel's mix" to make it deeper. I'll keep adding mix until the scallions get bigger. Will be interesting to see if this how this works.

As I said earlier Nancy came for a visit and had a surprise in mind. As an early Christmas present she planned a remodel, with some new furniture, and cleaning up and out of my craft room. We had a great week looking at all the hidden treasures, building some Ikea furniture, and then putting things back into useful places. The big green desk in the back of the left photo did not get moved but everything else did (The desk belonged to my grandfather, William Finch). The right photo shows the amazing results along one wall. It turned out awesome. Nancy and I sat down on opposite sides of the new desk and each made a card on Friday morning. What fun!!! Sorry to see her fly home today but her family misses her.