Tag Archives: cauliflower

May 20, 2022 · 9:37 am

It’s Friday

EBENBLATT-Katzen-amzn.to

Happy Friday!

Sad to say we’re not having Lunch Bunch today. Everyone is under the weather – except for my husband and me – so hopefully everyone will feel better soon and we’ll see each other NEXT Friday.

ML Lewis

This is probably the last beach photo this trip from our virtual vacation with my SIL. She’s spending the last day on the beach searching for shark teeth and enjoying perfect weather there. I’m so glad she gets to do this with her friends each year. AND I’m delighted that we get to share the ‘calm’ and beauty with her vicariously. :0)

Source Unknown

Yesterday I got out and pruned and staked my 4 zucchini plants. If it isn’t a good thing, it’s not a problem. My husband won’t eat zucchini anyway. If it’s successful, I’ll be a very happy planter. :0)


You can see two of the four plants here.

And here are some of the tomato plants on the other side of the house.

And finally, I went ahead and brought in three of the four cauliflower plants. They were showing signs I didn’t like. The heads are small – about 4″ across, but they are the first actually heads I’ve grown and I’m grinning from ear to ear. (My husband won’t eat cauliflower, either, but that’s HIS loss….

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May 18, 2022 · 11:29 am

Staking Plants

The two pics above show the staking of my tomato plants in the two brick planters we converted to square foot planters several years ago.

I found a nice video https://youtu.be/q4IUhZMA9O0 on pruning tomato plants for maximum yield. After finally overcoming intimidation by the whole idea, I’m doing this, for better or worse, though my husband may plant ME in the back yard if I kill our chance for lovely ripe tomatoes this year. I changed to using only single stakes, giving me the most access to the plants as they grow. I’m planning to check them once a week to see what they need.

Yesterday I learned I should be staking my zucchini plants, as well! https://www.theartofdoingstuff.com/youve-been-growing-your-zucchini-all-wrong/ I will have to get a bit creative to do this because my raised-bed, square-foot-garden planters are up off the ground (chest high) and are only 8 inches deep.

I’m much less intimidated by the idea of pruning my zucchini plants than my tomatoes. My husband won’t each zucchini. I grow them for the fun, and also because I like to make and eat ‘zoodles’ (fake noodles made from spiralized zucchini.)

https://www.theartofdoingstuff.com/youve-been-growing-your-zucchini-all-wrong/

Zoodles allow me to eat low carb spaghetti sauce, low carb alfredo sauce, etc., without feeling guilty.

The only one who will be disappointed if my efforts don’t work here is me, so the pressure is off. :0)

I’ll try to get pics of the four plants after I figure out how to stake them up a bit and get them pruned.

These don’t need staking, but I just wanted to share my delight that my cauliflower plants are still alive and the heads are growing. I don’t know how much longer I’ll be able to allow them to grow, but I’m like a kid at Christmas. :0)

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May 14, 2022 · 10:27 am

Garden – Initial Assessment

After a week or so of not being able to work in the garden, things are pretty out of hand. My tomato plants are looking healthy, but I’ll need to get serious about pruning this week. I’ll concentrate on trying to be outside early in the morning, or before dark in the evening, or both, until I get things under control. I’ll try to carefully prune, then anchor the plants to the supports.

The veggie garden has exploded. The onion stalks are now over a foot tall. The zucchini plants are huge and blossoming. The record heat has almost done-in the broccoli before it really had a chance to get started. It’s starting to bolt, so I’ll harvest what I can today. Weeds are rampant. The lettuce leaves are huge.

Here’s a close up of a broccoli plant. You can see that the broccoli isn’t nice and compact. It’s growing tall. I need to harvest today to have anything from these at all. :0(

Aside from the gazillion tiny weeds, you can see how TALL this lettuce plant is. That’s not a good sign. Lettuce, broccoli, spinach and cauliflower are early spring plants, needing the cooler weather. I hope that the lettuce leaves are not already bitter. I’ll bite one and see.

I’ll be doing a lot of careful harvesting this weekend, one thing at a time, between rain storms. You would THINK with all this rain the temperature would be cooler, rather than like a sauna…

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April 20, 2022 · 10:02 am

And This is How My Garden Grows…

It’s too rainy to be out working in the garden or the yard today, but –

“Save a boyfriend for a rainy day – and another, in case it doesn’t rain.” ~ Mae West

David Hobson – Better Homes and Gardens – QuoteMaster
My veggie garden is doing well. I’ll start harvesting some lettuce and spinach probably in the next week or so.
Leaf Lettuce – Romaine
I have to admit I’m not really sure whether this one is broccoli or cauliflower.
Spinach
If you look closely, you can see the CUTEST broccoli ever in the center of this plant.
Zucchini

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April 7, 2022 · 11:27 am

How Does Your Garden Grow?

etsy.com

I’ve only had to cover up my veggie plants once for a freeze since I put the plants in the ground, and for that I’m thankful. I’m watching the weather forecasts like a hawk, but so far, things are going well.

leaf lettuce
Spinach
Broccoli
Cauliflower
You can see the red onion sprouts, too.
You can also see some of the neon-pink surveyor’s tape I put on the fence so the deer won’t run into the fence.

Next up, I plan to put in radishes, bell pepper, and celery.

Today’s plan is to start prepping the two brick planters on the far side of the house that we converted to square foot garden planters, preparing to add some tomato plants, probably next week, depending on the weather. I need to get the weeds out, and then add a bunch of Mel’s Mix (a mixture of peat moss, Vermiculite, and at least 3 different types of compost) to each of the planters. Who knows where this stuff GOES?

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March 27, 2022 · 12:54 pm

Garden 3-27-2022

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I just checked my veggie garden and things seem to be going really well at this point. I could actually start harvesting some lettuce leaves, but I think I’ll let them go awhile longer.

You can see spinach, red onion sprouts, leaf lettuce, and one broccoli or cauliflower plant in this box.

broccoli and lettuce

Spinach, red onions, broccoli and cauliflower

Spinach. I can’t wait to start harvesting these leaves. I plan to put lots in our salads, saute some of them in extra virgin olive oil and bacon bits with a bit of garlic, and then freeze the rest. I really hope I get a good crop this year.

This afternoon, I’ll mix up several two-gallon containers of KillzAll. I’ll spray some under the planter boxes and around my garden, and then move on from there – as many containers as I can during the afternoon.

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March 23, 2022 · 10:49 am

Beware

In my travels around the yard, I went out to check my early spring raised-bed square foot garden. So far, the plants seem very happy.

“It was such a pleasure to sink one’s hands into the warm earth, to feel at one’s fingertips the possibilities of the new season.” ~ Kate Morton

This is my veggie garden. I have yet to plant radishes, and I’m still on the look-out for head lettuce, since that’s my husband’s favorite. We both love fresh, ripe, home-grown tomatoes, but it’s too early to plant those. I’ve converted two or our handmade brick planters on the other side of the yard on the far side of the house to be tomato planters. I’ll share pics of those when we get them planted later on. As you can see here, one of the next things I’ll do is mix up some weed killer and spray it on the ground underneath my planters. I’ll also spray a perimeter around the whole garden, outside the fence. Another chore is to find our bright, neon-colored tape to string through the fencing so the deer don’t run into it.
Here’s a closer view of a couple of the six planters we have. You can see I’ve really spread the plants out this year. some of the squares are empty, hoping for the head lettuce or radishes, but you can see the wispy sprouts of the sweet red onions on the right of the picture if you look carefully.
Spinach
Leaf Lettuce – Romaine

I’m thankful for a warm, dry home this morning. I really got chilled on my walk, but my spirits are definitely lifted now.

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March 17, 2022 · 9:49 am

The Spring Garden Has Sprung

I had filled up our raised bed, square-foot planters with Mel’s Mix (peat moss, vermiculite, and three kinds of compost) at the end of fall. We put a square plastic bucket in the middle of each planter, then stretched a tarp over each box, using bungee cords to secure them. We had to replace the tarps about a month ago or so, since the weather and sun had pretty much disintegrated them. The purpose of this was to try NOT to have to spend several days prepping the garden before I could plant.

When I started yesterday, the tarps were completely water-laden. I pulled them off the planters and spread them beside the shop, holding them in place with bricks, to dry in the sun. I stored the plastic buckets and bungee cords in one of the trash cans and put it under one of the planters.

There were VERY few weeds in the planters, so I was able to get started with the planting almost immediately! Hooray!!!!!!

If you look carefully, you can see the wire we strung in two directions, creating the ‘squares’ for planting. I was able to get spinach, red onion sets, broccoli, leaf lettuce, and cauliflower plants in town.

I got everything planted except for the red onion sets. I’ll try to get those planted today.

I need to find the timer for our irrigation system, put new batteries in it, and hook it up to the garden faucet, and then hook up the hoses that go to the garden planters.

You can see the hose that runs down the middle of the three planters on one side of the garden. You can also see the sprinkler in the middle of each box. Both sides are set up the same way, then tied together so the whole system works as one on the timer.

I’ll try to get the red onion sets planted today. We’re due for rain late this evening-into-tomorrow, so it’ll be okay if I wait until the weekend to get the irrigation system set up.

I’ll see what other plants are available the next time we have a chance.

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April 23, 2017 · 3:26 pm

Garden Images – April, 2017

I’ve just come in from a little over an hour of weeding and pruning in the garden. The pictures here were taken BEFORE I did that, ad I’m cringing a bit that you can see some little weeds and leaves that need to be removed, etc., but I wanted to share my delight in how well things seem to be doing now.

I actually have little bitty heads of broccoli coming on!

 

This is a terrible picture, but I have TWO cauliflower heads showing!

 

This is the largest celery plant, though I have several others. No clue yet whether I’ll actually get a stalk or not. (See what I mean about the little weeds? Most of them are gone now.

 

These are Georgia Sweet Onions. They seem to be happy now, rebounding from the hail storm.

 

This is one of two squares of radishes.

 

Red leaf lettuce.

 

This is the largest of the spaghetti squash plants I started from seed in the house.

 

And spinach. I was so delighted to find plants for sale this year at the local co-op. I hope that I thanked the guy effusively enough that he’ll try to get them again and again. I can’t be the only person looking for them and wanting to grow it.

I mainly cut up spinach for salads, or put the leaves in the rare sandwiches we eat now. I’m going to try to actually cook the leaves this year. It might be a thing where we love the stuff in the can, but the actually fresh leaves taste like a completely ‘different animal.’

Does anyone have directions for how best to cook fresh spinach leaves?

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March 21, 2017 · 1:53 pm

Playing in the Garden

Delightful Children’s Books

 

I’m very happy that our garden is alive at all right now. Our weather has roller-coastered between hard freezes and a high of 90 today. We also had a timer malfunction on the garden irrigation system, so the plants were really badly overwatered at one point before we figured out the problem and replaced the timer.

 

Now I THINK we’re finished with the hard freezes. Our temperatures are still roller-coaster-y, though. 90 today. 60 tomorrow. 80 the following day….

 

I need to take some sharp scissors to clean up the plants. Some have bad leaves. I did get out a few arrogant weeds today, though. :0)

 

Here you see red lettuce leaves and spinach.

 

As you can see in this, and the next, pictures, some of the celery is doing well. Some has croaked.

 

 

This is the south side of the garden. I’m growing Georgia Sweet Onions in the back, red lettuce and spinach in the middle, and broccoli, cauliflower, and celery in the box closest to you.

 

Romaine lettuce, spinach, broccoli, cauliflower, radishes, and red lettuce in the planters in the north row.

 

Spinach sprouts on the window sill.

 

One celery plant and two spaghetti squash sprouts here.

Hopefully, things will settle down now and my plants can grow in peace.

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March 16, 2017 · 2:46 pm

How Does Your Garden Grow?

Ashevillage

 

Here is one row of our garden. You can see three ‘boxes’ from front to back tied together by the irrigation system, which is on a timer we can control. Most of the garden is in now.

 

This is the second row of the garden with another three boxes.

I just went over and hugged my husband again, thanking him (1) for the idea of our building a raised garden (when he saw how very hot, tired, and achy I got getting up and down, planting, weeding, and harvesting the garden on the ground), (2) for all the time and energy he spent building and installing the boxes, cutting and welding the support tables that hold up the wooden boxes, designing the irrigation system, (3) for encouraging me to spend what I needed to get – and keep – things going in the garden.

 

I visit the garden at least once a day – covering or uncovering the plants in protecting them from freezes, pulling the weeds that install themselves even up in the air, pulling off dead leaves on the plants, taking pics, and – the best part – when I can actually start harvesting what we’ve grown!

 

I’ve planted Georgia Sweet Onions, Broccoli, Cauliflower, Red Lettuce, Romaine Lettuce, Spinach, Radishes, celery, and spaghetti squash. Probably next month, when the stores have a good selection, I’ll get three tomato plants. In another three weeks, I’ll get three more, making a total of six. We have two brick planters on the east side of the house converted to square foot gardens, filled with Mel’s Mix, ready to receive the plants.

 

We’re off to a good start!

Do you like to grow veggies? I would love to hear from you, comparing notes on how you do it.  I would love to hear about tips you have on getting a healthy crop, suggestions you have so that I can do a better job. I’m a real novice and appreciate all the help I can get. :0)

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March 8, 2017 · 6:08 pm

Our Garden is Officially Started!

This is the first time we’ve had all six raised bed square foot garden boxes in our garden! We have SIX 4′ x 4′ x 8″ boxes on legs connected by an irrigation system so that we can water everything on a timer. Each box has a sprinkler in the center. The timer is between the house and the garden, and we can either just turn it on to water manually, or use the timer so that all gets watered for a specific amount of time daily.

 

We have fencing plus chicken wire around the garden to keep critters out. The pink tape is to keep deer from running into the fencing at night. We can put bird netting and shade fabric over the top of the garden, if needed.

 

I found SPINACH plants!  Hooray!!!!!!!

 

 

These are romaine lettuce plants.

 

This is red leaf lettuce.

 

Georgia sweet onions.

 

Cauliflower.

 

Broccoli.

I have moved some of my window sill plants to the back porch in preparation for moving them out to the garden. I have some celery plants and some spaghetti squash plants. My spinach seeds have tiny sprouts on the window sill now. I may have some more spaghetti squash plants.

I’ll probably get more plants tomorrow. I want the local co-op guy to REALLY know how much I appreciate his getting spinach plants this year.

We have some issues with water pressure right now on the irrigation system. After messing with things for quite awhile this afternoon, we think we must have a hose blowout somewhere between the well house and the garden, but we were too tired to tackle the problem today. Tomorrow is another day…

 

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November 29, 2016 · 5:46 pm

Garden Wrapped Up for the Night

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I just spent an hour in our raised bed, square foot garden,  weeding, pruning, and harvesting lettuce and some small bits of broccoli.

 

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These pics were taken before I started pruning. You can see some of the leaves that needed to be cut.

 

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This is mainly broccoli and cauliflower.

 

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This is a good pic to show the whole fall garden. I can’t tell you how much I love being able to take care of things without having to bend over double or get up and down on my hands and knees over and over.  I got the three planters covered with sheets before I left because it’s supposed to freeze tonight.

gard11292016-3

I never thought I would describe cauliflower as “cute,” but I have the sweetest, teeny, tiny heads of cauliflower I’m trying to protect. The largest one is about 2-1/2 inches across.

 

gard11292016-7

The lettuce is still producing, though I’m having to prune more and more leaves off, due to the incredible changes in temperature. (Example – 70 degrees this afternoon, and 32 degrees tomorrow morning…) If you look carefully, you can see a salad blend plant in this pic – toward the upper left hand corner – it’s burgundy.

 

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Here’s a difference kind of lettuce. It’s still looking pretty good.

 

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This is the ‘celery that could’ (like the little engine that could in the children’s story.) I planted it weeks ago. It’s still little bitty, but – as you can see – very healthy and green. I’m cheering it on, trying to protect it as much as possible. SWEET little celery plant…

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November 21, 2016 · 1:22 pm

The Garden Still Lives!

garden1

For two nights this week I’ve had to spread sheets over our fall raised bed, square foot garden, trying to bring the plants through the freezes. Last night it wasn’t supposed to freeze, so I held my breath and didn’t cover the plants. I went out to check on things this morning and all our plants were still alive! I have several different types of lettuce that I’m HOPING I can continue to harvest into January. Time will tell. The above is head lettuce.

 

garden2

I’m not sure what this is called, but the leaves are frilly and curly.

 

garden4

This is kind of ruffle-y.

 

garden5

This is one of the two raised bed planters that are almost entirely devoted to broccoli and cauliflower, although you can see two lettuce plants on the left.

 

garden6

This planter is almost entirely lettuces. If you look carefully, there’s a ‘salad blend’ brownish lettuce in the center. The weather was so warm I almost lost the lettuce plants due to them trying to bolt. That’s why the plants are so tall. I have no clue what will happen, but I’m harvesting every two or three days for as long as they’ll allow.

 

garden3

This is the treasure I found this morning – a teeny, tiny head of cauliflower! Isn’t it cute? :0)

I tried to grow celery this year, planting three ‘bottoms’ of celery I had gotten at the store. Two immediately croaked when I transferred them to the planter, but one is still alive, quite green, but only has small leaves and doesn’t seem to be growing. I’m just glad I tried, kept one alive, and will keep trying.

I finally folded up the king sized sheets I used to cover the planters. We MIGHT get much-needed rain tomorrow and I don’t want the sheets to get wet.

So far, so good!

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November 16, 2016 · 3:25 pm

The Fall Raised Bed Square Foot Garden

fallgardennov1

You can see two of the three 4×4 foot squares of our raised bed, square foot garden in this picture. I’ve been trying to grow broccoli, cauliflower, two kinds of lettuce, celery, and radishes this fall. You can also see the three NEW squares we now have ready for the spring.

 

fallgardennov2

I harvested some broccoli and some lettuce this afternoon. I’ll post pics as soon as my camera battery is recharged. (Don’t you wish WE could recharge our batteries by just plugging into an outlet on the wall?)

 

fallgardennov3

Our weather here is nuts. We’ve been having some really nice weather for the past couple of weeks. Today and tomorrow, though, the highs are in the mid 80’s – followed by Friday, Saturday, and Sunday with possible hard freezes. I’ll go out and clean up the garden as much as possible this afternoon. Tomorrow evening we’ll take down the automatic irrigation system for the garden. I’ll still be able to turn it on manually, if needed, but we don’t want the system to freeze. I’ll also plan to cover the plants with sheets for the three days. We usually have a cold snap that kills everything, followed by warmer weather. I’ll do what I can to keep things going as long as possible.

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October 25, 2016 · 8:11 pm

The Irrigation System is Working!

ir5

My husband worked really hard in the bright sun today, adding irrigation to the three new raised bed planters.  In the middle of each raised box, we have a sprinkler. The three of these are tied together by lengths of hose mounted on 1 x 2s that span the length of the three planters. Then the three sprinklers are attached to the main control, a faucet that we can use to control the amount of water that is sprinkled onto the plants. We can control the north side of the garden separately from the south side. These are attached to a hose that runs to the outdoor faucet on which we have a control system with a timer that allows us to select when the plants are watered and for how long a time.

 

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These are the three new planters on the north side of the garden. We’ll use these starting in the spring.

 

 

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These are the three planters on the south side of the garden where I’ve planted two kinds of lettuce, some celery, radishes, broccoli and cauliflower.

 

 

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The two kinds of lettuce (head lettuce and salad blend) are mainly in the closest planter in the picture, though the bright green in the second planter is also head lettuce.

 

ir1

This is the garden, with the picture taken looking to the west. I need to harvest again soon! :0)

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October 22, 2016 · 1:33 pm

Fall Garden Progress 10-22-2016

fallgarden5

This is a planter with broccoli and cauliflower. The plants are looking healthy, but I have no clue how much actual FOOD we’ll get…

 

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On the far right and the far left, toward the top of this picture, you can see some broccoli florets! Woo Hoo!!!! :0)

 

fallgarden8

This planter is mainly two kinds of lettuce: head lettuce and ‘salad blend’. There is a teeny tiny celery plant that is very green and still alive, and I’m going to plant a 2nd batch of radishes today.

The next pictures you see won’t have the fabric shade at the top. I’m about to go out now, spread the cedar chips under the new planters, and start snipping wire tires that hold the fabric shade in place all the way around the garden.

Wish me luck?

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October 9, 2016 · 6:12 pm

Fall Garden – 10/9/2016

I enjoyed harvesting some lettuce and a batch of radishes today.

lettuce

 

 

radishes

We put up another raised bed planter recently. It’s the first of three on the north side of the garden.

 

rbp1northside

You can see that I’ll need to make more Mel’s Mix to fill this planter up. You can also see the template we use to figure out where to drill the holes for the planter legs standing up against the back fence of the garden.

 

rbp2

This picture shows the spot between the raised bed planter and the last on-the-ground square foot planter. I dug the Mel’s Mix out of the one in the middle, putting it into three trash cans, waiting for us to install the 2nd planter. That will leave just one more planter and our project will be finished and ready for next spring’s planting.

 

rbp3-southside

Meanwhile, we’re really enjoying the fall garden in the raised bed planters on the south side of the garden. Here you can see the empty square where I harvested the batch of radishes. I’ll plant some more in the next day or two. The empty looking square next to the corner one has a piece of celery trying to grow.

 

rbp4-southside

The other two planters have a bunch of healthy looking greenery from cauliflower and broccoli plants, but nothing that looks like veggies yet.

 

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This is a close up of the lettuce plants. Some are called ‘salad blend,’ and the bright green are head lettuce. (Please pretend you DON’T see the little weed in the bottom right hand corner…)  :0)

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September 28, 2016 · 1:48 pm

Fall Garden Update – 9/28/2016

garden-northside

This picture shows you the north side of our square foot garden. We finally got the last vertical pole out, so we can now start installing the three raised bed garden boxes and the irrigation system that will go with it. We’re not going to plant in these until next spring, so we’re not in a hurry. I’m emptying out each 4 foot x 4 foot square into trash cans, saving as much of the Mel’s Mix as possible. Then we fill the planter box and then move to the next one.

 

rbg4

This is the first of the three raised bed planters we’re using for our fall garden. The plants have at least doubled in size now. We have a broccoli plant, some celery, and two different kinds of lettuce planted in this one: salad blend and head lettuce.

 

rbg5

This is the second raised bed planter. We have head lettuce (the light green plants close to you) and the rest is broccoli and cauliflower plants. I have no clue whether I’m just going to get a lot of green, or actually get broccoli and cauliflower. Fingers are crossed.

 

rbg6This is the third raised bed planter, filled with broccoli and cauliflower. I really love the way I can walk around each raised bed, can reach all the squares easily for planting, weeding, and harvesting.

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September 27, 2016 · 11:07 am

Fall Garden Harvest # 2

lettuceharvest09262016_1

The fall garden is doing really well right now. I harvested lettuce for the 2nd time yesterday. I could have harvested a bunch more, but I want it to last as long as possible. We’re eating a lot of salad now, and enjoying about half of it being from our garden. The plants are really producing, happy with the suddenly cooler weather (high of about 80 degrees F). I think both plants and people are feeling a burst of energy right now. :0)

 

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The celery I tried to grow by cutting off the bottoms of the celery I bought at the store and putting them in water to grow roots, then putting them in the garden didn’t work yet. I have another plant started in the house and will transfer it to the garden as soon as it looks like it might live out there. I love this idea and will keep trying it.

Our cauliflower and broccoli plants have doubled in size in the past few days. I can’t believe how large they are. So far, they’re just leaves, and I’m HOPING we actually get some veggies, instead of just showy plants….

My radishes are looking good, too.

_________________

My husband got antsy to try to get the last large vertical pipe out of the garden yesterday. We haven’t received the replacement pipe puller yet, but he decided yesterday was the day. He MADE a puller out of iron, putting stiffeners on the edges and cutting the hole in it freehand with the torch. It gave a good pull, but no bananas. We put a bunch of water around the concrete, thinking that would make the pulling more effective. We did this twice, to no avail. We took the grinder and a long extension cord out there and he cut the pipe off at ground level.

Now he’s antsy to start installing the last three raised planters we made for the garden, but we have other priorities right now. We have plenty of time. We’re not going to use them until the spring.

Meanwhile, I hope I’m not driving you nuts, telling you how MUCH I loved the raised planters. I walk out, stand there calmly pulling out weeds and adding them to the bucket I brought out, or snipping lettuce leaves in comfort, putting them in the special harvesting basket. I’m STANDING there, doing my gardening, not down on my hands and knees, getting up and down, up and down, over and over until I’m exhausted; or bending over double in order to reach the weeds or plants. I’m thoroughly spoiled already!!!!

 

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September 20, 2016 · 12:02 pm

Fall Garden 2016

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Here is one of our fall raised bed planters. I’ve planted radishes, celery, salad blend lettuce, and head lettuce in this one.

 

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The second planter has some head lettuce, cauliflower, and broccoli.

 

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And the third planter has broccoli and cauliflower.

I can’t tell you how wonderful it is that this old broad can walk out to the garden and plant, weed, and harvest while standing up comfortably!  I have no clue whether the plants will be successful or not, but I have some good, healthy plants at this point and lots of enthusiasm.

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September 10, 2016 · 2:37 pm

Planted and UnPlanted

gardeningkiwi.wordpress.com

gardeningkiwi.wordpress.com

We had a good storm overnight. We awoke to low 80’s and MUCH less humidity!  Hooray!!!

I had gotten two 6-packs of head lettuce yesterday, so I got those planted today, finishing up my fall garden planting in my new raised bed planters. I have broccoli, cauliflower, celery, carrots, radishes, and two kinds of lettuce: ‘salad blend’ and ‘head lettuce.’

I used this opportunity to go ahead and dismantle the north side of the garden. I harvested what I could – one small tomato and some cucumbers – and then laboriously pulled out all the plants, small tomato cages, large tomato cages, etc. Since we’re replacing the ground square foot planters with three more raised bed planters, I also dismantled that side of the irrigation system, then unscrewed the wooden and pvc pipe dividers. I had to work hard to get the small fence down that we had put up for climbing plants, but I got it unhooked and rolled it up and took it out of the garden.

The next step – NOT TODAY! – will be to start carefully digging up the Mel’s Mix from the planting squares so we can use it as part of the filling for the new planters once we get them up.

I’ll take pics as we go. We don’t need the new planters up until spring, so we’ll try to choose the nicest days we can find. Meanwhile, I’ll try to get some pics of the fall garden to show you.

I worked outside for over 3 hours today, so this old lady is more than ready for some lunch, another bottle of water, and some serious relaxing!

Hope your day is going well, too!

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September 2, 2016 · 3:14 pm

Eureka!

GreenlaneGardens

GreenlaneGardens

I was starting to lose hope on finding salad plants for my fall garden. My husband said he wanted to go to north Fort Smith after Lunch Bunch today, so suggested I call Neumeier Nursery & Florist to see if they had lettuce. (I had gone to, or called everyone else, including Sutherlands in Fort Smith, who said they MIGHT get some in the next few weeks, but they didn’t know for sure.)

We got the supplies my husband wanted and then made our way to the far side of Fort Smith to Neumeier’s. This is such a wonderful place. I’m very thankful we don’t live close to them, or my husband would be VERY upset at all the money I would spend. Not only did they have lettuce plants for me, they also have a wonderful shop with all KINDS of wonderful, useless things I WANT. Even my husband saw a ceramic painted and glazed tree frog on the wall he wanted. When we discovered the price, we decided we could live without him…

I got ten ‘salad blend’ plants. The lady told me to wait a week before planting them to give them time to grow better roots. My husband suggested that I put the whole flat of plants on top of the free raised bed planter. This way they’ll get sun and be watered each day while they continue growing their roots.

I’ll try to get them planted Thursday or Friday of next week. When I get these in the ground, my fall garden will be complete, except that I’ll start another square of radishes, and have one remaining square to try to grow celery from the bottoms I’m cutting and sprouting from my grocery store celery. I’m excited. Last fall was the first time I’ve ever tried to have a fall garden. We had fresh lettuce and spinach through January!

I also harvested yesterday. Here’s a picture –

 

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I think these are the weirdest cucumbers I’ve ever had. The dark green one in the middle MIGHT be Zucchini, but I’m not sure. Things are really winding down in the main garden now, even though we still have a lot of greenery. I’m going to start pulling things up and cleaning things out in preparation for transitioning the north side of the garden into the rest of the raised bed garden. We have three 4’x4′ boxes and the metal support supplies ready whenever the garden is over and I get things cleaned out. Happy gardening!

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August 31, 2016 · 11:54 am

Fall Garden Begun!

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It was super hot and muggy here yesterday afternoon (heat index 100 degrees +), but we had found cauliflower and broccoli plants at Sutherlands. I got two 9 packs of each. The picture above shows our new raised bed planters for the fall garden. There are three 4 foot x 4 foot raised planters in a row with sprinklers attached for irrigation. This is a picture of what they looked like when we started.

 

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We used really stretchy nylon string to mark the squares, anchoring the string on short screws I put in a 1 foot intervals around the planter edge.

 

 

 

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In a square foot garden, broccoli and cauliflower plants are planted one per square foot. You can see the markers in this picture. I was careful to plant broccoli in every other square so no two broccoli plants were planted side by side in either direction. According to Mel, this helps keep diseases down. I’ll take careful pictures of where things were planted in each raised bed so that I plant different kinds of plants in each square next time. This is for crop rotation.

 

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The plants I had filled two of the planters. Today I’ll plant some celery I started from ends of stalks bought at the grocery store, putting the ends in water and letting them sprout, plus carrots and radishes. I’m waiting for lettuce and spinach to be available at the co-op or Sutherlands to complete the fall garden.

  • Note 1: My moniker “Serial Seed Killer” is still sadly intact.  The broccoli was sprouting, and some of the lettuce. My husband thought the tray needed more sun, so we took it out and put it on the porch. A storm suddenly blew up and blew the top off the tray. We replaced it, but the damage was done. The sweet little sprouts lay dead the next morning. :0(
  • Note 2: Even though it took me two sessions to get things planted – due to my getting over-heated and needing to drink water, cool off, and rest after the first session, the raised planters we installed are WONDERFUL. We made sure that I can get in-between each planter easily, so I’m not having to do a balancing act to reach each of the squares. I didn’t have to bend over double or get up and down on my knees over and over to get the planting done!
  • Note 3: I harvested a few tomatoes yesterday, but the north side of the garden is almost done – even though we still have a lot of greenery. When things are finished for the year, I’ll carefully pull the plants and we’ll dismantle the planters on the ground, one at a time, replacing them with the remaining three raised bed planters. They are ready to install. We’ll wait until the weather cools off, too, so we’ll have an easier time with the install than we did with the south side.

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