The Vivid Colors of Nutrition and Gardening Zen
I realized this weekend that I must have reached my gardening “vanishing point”. While I most certainly had passed the point of no return a long time ago, I feel like I’m finally approaching the place I want to be with all of this.
So why this revelation?
I’m not exactly sure, but being able to notice the sun shining through these young Red Russian kale against the backdrop of the late afternoon sun (for no particular reason), then taking the time to squat down and frame this picture from 2 inches above the dirt may have been my moment of gardening Zen. 😉
Who knows, a modest Buddha may find its way behind the fence.
I think Mrs cohutt would approve, although she did make me take the creepy doll head I dug up off of the display stake. (She’s no fun sometimes.)
Update From The HOT House
With the first two days of April bringing highs in the upper 80s, I’m struggling to keep the polytunnel ventilated well enough to keep the lettuce from bolting (the spinach is already toast).
You may recall I started removing the ends a couple of weeks back; the door and window are both down now and a fan pulls air through from 11:00AM until 6:00PM. I’ve found that the key is not to let it heat up early, if this happens it is difficult to get the temps back under control without some lucky breezes.
I’m giving the middle bed a break from tomatoes this year, so it will host the cool weather crops into the last reaches of spring. Beans will follow for the nitrogen they will leave behind (except for the north end, which will be host to a “semi permanent” artichoke plant shortly.)
In the meantime, the bed is flush with lettuce and kale that so far is resisting major bolting (and the previously referenced toasted spinach in the foreground); note the open north end with the hanging fan blowing away:
The temperatures have allowed me to keep the tomato and pepper starts out on top of the “double water barrel table” for a few weeks now. I’ll start transplanting this week; all in all the basement grow box and the poly tunnel have made things much easier this year.
This year’s tomatoes and a few peppers:
One more thing: I prove again that total slackness in garden maintenance often yields results that I couldn’t get if I tried….
Two years ago I started some “Tommy Toe” cherry tomatoes at the same time. It is a scientific fact that a single plant provides about 10,000 more tomatoes that a human can eat in a season, and therefore about 5000 of these will drop and hit the ground, be hauled off by squirrels or grackles to be dropped in a surprise spot, or be left on the plant until they are pulled and composted.
Last year I never started a seed; I just encouraged some of the dozens of volunteers that appeared everywhere. When the season was over I meant to compost mine after I pulled them; I really did. Apparently placing them aside “temporarily” on top of a compost pile doesn’t exactly work, as proven by the hatchling Tommy Toe army in the gourd box that received the bulk of that particular compost pile this spring.
Anyone need a Tommy Toe plant? These things are 3 times the size of the carefully started and coddled seedlings in the previous picture. Go figure.
Bogs alive
The blocks of our mountain bog that I cut out and transported 90 miles to the edge of my little pond have awakened.
The buds have turned into fiddleheads and the hostas are continuing to come out. Much more work to do but so far, so good.
(No narrative today, enjoy the break.)
And….
Late Leeks ?
The 2011 summer was half way over when I added Leeks to a seed order from Johnny’s. I didn’t start the seeds until the last week of July and didn’t read the recommended start (early spring haha ) until much later.
Next time perhaps I should do my homework and research things a little better. Luckily, this time we got away with it. The last two I pulled were beginning to form the central stalk or scape. It doesn’t take long for the core of the leek to morph into a woody dowel once this starts so I pulled the 10 largest ones.
A little lean, but not bad for “mistakes”, eh?
Trimmed for the crisper drawer:
And yes, the seeds are already started for 2012’s fall & winter leek harvest.
And who was waiting for me after work?
This is silly.
Our new best buddy, the urban quail, was back this evening. He spotted the monster kitteh and decided that the view from above Lizzie’s porch was preferred to the view from under Lizzie’s porch.
And who was jealous?
“Quail, schmail…. get over yourself, you’re still just a bird.”
Urban Quail Tale
Early yesterday evening I was sitting on my back steps labeling some freshly seeded soil blocks (6 different Basils in the first batch this year) when I heard an unusual bird call, a long loud whistle. It was familiar to me but I was certain I had never heard it in my neighborhood; it was a rural, wild sound.
First, A little about my location and my neighborhood:
I live in a commercially landlocked “National Historic District” neighborhood that dates from the mid 1800s. It is downtown in a city of perhaps 35,000 people in a small county that pushes 100,000 total. We are shoulder to shoulder down here, as my “large” downtown lot is only 70′ wide and 240′ deep; line a couple more of these up and you almost have a short landing strip.
We are in a peninsular noose formed by the confluence of two rivers; while the rivers are very close to me in pretty much every direction, there isn’t much green space on either side of them. The aerial shot below shows the neighborhood and the surrounding area; I am on the southeastern edge of the heavily treed residential area that shows roughly the boundaries of “the hood”.
I finished the basil labeling and started to inspect/water/weed and do a little cleanup per the standing request of Mrs cohutt. I was @ the front steps of Lizzie’s house when out of the corner of my eye I noticed some motion behind the boxwood to my left.
I had discovered the source of the unusual call earlier: A single quail was foraging around the foundation of the little house and wasn’t particularly concerned with my presence. As he moved around I tried to get a decent shot of him but he was particularly adept at ducking behind any sort of low cover just as I raised the camera. I managed to catch him moving over an old railroad tie that is in the process of being removed:
I alerted mrs cohutt by text then continued to follow my new friend around the yard as he selectively stopped and consumed a few small seeds here and there (all weed seeds as far as I could tell; he has an open invitation to return).
He decided the confined area where we both were awaiting mrc cohutt’s visit was a bit boxed in for his comfort so he briskly out flanked me to the more open space towards the back of the yard:
Mrs cohutt joined us for a few minutes; he eventually decided two dumfounded humans watching him forage was making him a little uncomfortable, so he flew over the fence and disappeared into the weedy jungle patch of privet, ivy and January jasmine across the alley.
As I am finishing this post over a cup of coffee, I can hear him announcing the pending sunrise from the small thicket that he disappeared into last night.
“The Urban Quail”; Will he stay for a while, or is he just passing through?
If he stays, will the shrill opponents of backyard poultry demand their idiotic and misinformed new zoning prohibition be expanded to include the often domesticated Bob White quail?
Ha.
Make Some Room for Some Summer
First: finish the bed I’d been putting off for months…. This will be for sweet potatoes and perhaps some bush beans of some sort this summer, but more importantly will allow for better rotation of some of the fall/winter/spring cycle crops over future seasons, mainly alliums (garlic, leeks, onions) and brassicas (kale/broccoli/cabbage/brussel sprouts). It will get proportionally more sun each day in the winter vs the summer and is in a frost friendly section of the yard (up the modest grade a bit).
The soil was excavated from the good compost rich spot where I grew okra last year (now occupied by the the frog pond) and mixed with my usual “soil free mix” of milled peat, vermiculite and compost.
(I had a few more bok choi, lettuce and 45 day cabbage starts leftover so I just stuck them in the end).
Second: Harvest some kale for the dual purpose of freeing up space and making a large batch of the soup I like so much (we will freeze most of it). This pile of Russian Red and Winterbor was only about 15% of what is available; there is going to be a lot of soup made in the next month if somebody doesn’t help me eat this (seriously, if you are local and would like some let me know, I’ll share).
Third: There was no “third”, so I’m just going to post some pictures from this weekend.
The “middle garden”
Front view
Middle view
Back view
Half and Half: Spring awakened Oregano on the left, the wintered over flat leaf Italian parsley on the right
Strawberry blooms and “green” berries:
Last call for winter greens
I guess this means spring is here…….
That's all.
Bounty of the Bog Raid
The modest bounty from the bog raid is presented here, with the exception of a couple of items whose photographs I managed to botch. All of these were cut from the bog with a straight spade and were at least 12″ square and 6″ deep. The moss has been further trimmed as needed to fill in the cracks.
A sample rhizome of what hopefully will soon be a stand of large fiddleheads on the way to becoming clump of monstrous ferns. (The two lighter objects that in the center of the dead stem cluster are the first fiddlehead buds. )
This is the same type of fern as these large ones, shown during early July in 2009 @ the edge of the same bog area (believe me now?):
A smaller more delicate type of fern rolling up (I’m not sure if the green stemmed specimens in the front are the same variety or not; they may well be the same as the all green fern a couple of pictures down the page):
Pardon the alignment of this second picture of the same:
A second type of small fern; note the entire body is green vs the red stems of the previous one. Look carefully to spot the micro fiddlehead in the picture.
And a close up of one of the types of moss that has been divided and placed in between (this was actually adjacent to the bog in a sunnier area near the creek):
The other couple of interesting items, well, the picture “she ees no good”. I try again tomorrow.
Behind cohutt's fence 