I thought I was done with the sickness....

Well, I didn't get as much done as I would have liked by now. I've been fighting flare ups of this and that. I'm not sure why I can't be done with sickness, but I know that Jesus will enjoy sickness free gardening with me in heaven. :)

So anyway, I did harvest about 10 pounds of Red Gold potatoes. They're quite good, and we've used about half of them. They are tiny though. Next year I want to order maybe these and a late potato variety to hill up in a bin. It's the later varieties, I've learned, that you can really hill and will produce a lot of nice sized potatoes.

I also started seeds inside for romaine, broccoli, cabbage, and celery. Most all are up. I was thinking I wouldn't have time for leeks, but someone posted on gardenweb that there should be time for someone in zone 6, so I think I will try to direct seed some in the fall bed.

I have cucumbers and squash overflowing in the refridgerator. This week I absolutely must get some pickles done and hopefully make some sweet relish too. Yesterday I finally picked my first tomato! It was a Moskovich, and it was pretty good. Not super good, but good. I'm looking forward to trying the other kinds as they come in to compare. My honeydew plant is totally taking over and has tons of flowers, but no baby melons yet.

Otherwise things are growing pretty good, the corn absolutely needs nitrogen and isn't as tall as I would like. I will never buy that soil again. Lasangna layers are definitely the way to go. I did add some bone & blood meal to my Sugar Snack cherry because the leaf tips were a bit purple as well.

Goals for this week:

1. Finish new lasagna bed and plant carrots, leeks, collards, scallions, and chard.
2. Fertilze 3 sisters bed.
3. Plant potatoes.
4. Make pickles & relish.
5. Take pictures of garden.
6. Order garlic.

Catching Up

I can't believe I haven't recorded my gardening stuff since February. I know I'm going to regret that next year. Here's a brief overview of what's been going on this year:

• I did make a container teepee for my peas this March. They did well, but for some reason didn't train to the teepee. It is defintely something I will do again though, mostly likely in September.
• My lemon balm actually came back! I am making sure to water it regularly.
• DH helped me build nice boxes for my raised beds, including one new one. So, now I have three nice ones. I'm still finishing up the layering of my new bed, but I should be ready this week to start my fall garden in it. I want to plant carrots, scallions, collards and romaine this week.
• I planted my potatoes in April. I didn't cut them up, just planted the whole potatoes. The plants were very vigorous, and I hilled them up twice with straw. Now the plants have pretty much died back, and I did find at least one potato in feeling around. I will probably dig them up this week. I also bought some Kennebec potatoes at the Chattanooga Market yesterday. I want to try a second crop of potatoes for fall this week as well.
• With the potatoes, I currently have a row of okra, a hill of sugar baby watermelon, two roma plants (one is a San Marzano), a tiburion hot pepper, an eggplant, three bell peppers (King Arthur, Golden Bell, & Red Beauty), a half row of cucumbers, two yellow squash, and a zucchini. I have already harvested a bunch of cucumbers and squash. The zucchini is still producing, but it looks wilty and generally sad. I'm wondering if it is a bit crowded by the squash plant next door. The peppers are slow, but I think they're finally growing. They did look a bit yellow. The romas have lots of green tomatoes on them. I think the San Marzanos are very close to turning red. The eggplant is very sad, just three leaves, not really growing. Okra and watermelon are looking good. Today I fertilized and mulched the peppers, tomatoes, and eggplant with grass clippings. I hope this will give them a boost.
• I added new soil in hills to the oldest bed for my three sisters patch. I was really late on this, I think I planted the corn at the end of May. It is now about 18 inches high. The pole beans are about 6 inches tall. I just planted the winter squash last week, but it is mostly up, and a couple of plants are starting to produce a third leaf. All the plants look great!
• In front of the office I have cantelope that I started from seed inside. They hardened off pretty well, but the soil isn't great and that end of the house has probably way too much sun. I started with 6 plants. I lost one to a cutworm in the first week. I almost lost all of them when I was sick a couple of weeks ago and didn't water. But all but one seem to be making it. I also have sunflowers struggling with them. I also fertilized and mulched with grass clippings here today.
• I also started honeydew inside from seed. It is in a huge container on the front porch and vining like crazy. No flowers yet though.
• In the rose bed I planted brandywine, moskovich, red zebra, and early girl tomatoes. The moskovich has had green tomatoes for several weeks now and aren't turning red. This is what inspired my fertilizer craze. Again, I fertilized and mulched with grass clippings.
• The garlic came up great on the left rose bed and not at all on the right one. (???) I pulled it up last week, and probably should have a couple of weeks sooner. The cloves are small, but from what I've been reading clay soil is very bad for garlic. I want to order some Spanish Rosa for this fall, and I will also spread a bunch of bone meal before I plant this time.
• On the back porch I used a lot of the soil from last year that was already in the containers. Big mistake! All those plants came up, but very weakly. I also have two cherry tomatoes (sugar snack and sweet 100) which look close to being ready. There is a new rosemary plant and a very happy sage plant. I just planted basil today. (again very late)
• DH tried an experiment of planting sweet potatoes on our steep front hill. I'm not sure how well it's going. They're not dead, but most of them aren't growing very much. Maybe their growth will pick up more this month.

Well, I think that's about caught up. I will try to get back to more regular posts. I also will try to post pictures this week.

Winter Break To Do List

1. Plant peas in a container teepee.
2. Plant spinach, lettuce, mustard, collards, chard, and maybe onions.
3. Clean front beds.
4. Build new raised bed.
5. Dig out small bed to put in better dirt.

Pinetree Order

A couple of weeks ago I finally made my Pinetree Garden Seeds order. Here is the list:

• Early carrots (mokum)
• Main carrots (red cored chantennay) - These should be pretty.
• Celery (Utah 52-70)
• Chard (rhubarb)
• Cantaloupe (honey rock)
• Honey dew (creme de menthe)
• Carnival squash
• Tomato (brandywine)
• Tomato (roma)
• Cilantro (delfino)
• Chili pepper (anaheim)
• Cabbage (Danish ballhead)
  
• Calendula (Pacific beauty mix)
• Potatoes (red gold) - I got 2 1/2 pounds of a hybrid between red potatoes and Yukon gold.

I have enough seeds of everything else I'm going to plant, I think. I'm really looking forward to growing my own potatoes as I'm learning more and more about it being one of the most important vegies to eat organically. It will also be interesting to try to grow tomatoes from seed this year. I will probably buy a few other varieties in plant form as well.

This weekend is our winter break, so I will hopefully be planting peas, spinach, lettuce, and some other greens. My beds still have a lot of cleaning up that is needed as well.