Saturday in the garden.

I know many of you are still buried under the snow storm.  Maybe a little more about my organic gardening will tide you over until you can get out and dig in your own dirt.

We've had an extremely warm winter this year.  Great for our heating bill, but not so great for the nearby winter olympics in Vancouver BC.  We're all in more or less the same weather area and the shortage of snow up north has kept us from freezing down here.  Anyhow, I've been watching the signs of spring for a few weeks now.  I held off on making any plantings because the calendar kept telling me "not yet Christi, it's just too soon."

Today I finally told that calendar to shut up!  It was a beautiful sunny day and by jove I was going to get in my garden to plant something!

With my seed stash in hand, I headed down to our little enclosed garden and threw open the gate then I got straight to work.  I pulled open the plastic cover on my boat garden and cleared out a few small weeds, cleaned the dead growth off the herbs, pulled out the brown leaves from the strawberries and planted 2 short rows of lettuce.  1 row is "salad bowl" and the second row is a mix of romaine with red and green leaf lettuce. 

The boat garden revealed - garlic, strawberries, fennel, lettuce and carrots

Next I focused my attention on an empty bed that held multi-colored carrots last year.  It is really important to rotate your garden crops to keep down on disease spread, so this year I planted 2 rows of my home grown organic onion sets and 3 intesively planted rows of peas from some seeds that my mom saved for me from her garden last year.

Now I was on a roll!  I still had 2 open beds ready for planting, so I went back through my seed stash and found a few more candidates for an early spring planting.  These beds grew my lushious tomato crops last year, so this year it would need to be something else. 

I decided 1 pea planting just won't be enough for me, especially since last years peas were devoured by our local deer (before we got the deer fence up).  I found a packet of Gray Dwarf peas in the mix.  These are really good.  You can use them as pea pods or as green peas, so I planted 1/2 of this open bed with the gray's, the other half I added 3 short rows of Olympic spinach, 3 short rows of Gormet Mix radishes and 3 plantings of Brussels sprouts.  Yummy! 

It doesn't look like much now, but in a couple

of months this intesive planting will be in full

production!

Feeling good about my progress, I decided to leave the bed unplanted for just a bit longer.  I threw the plastic cover back over the boat garden and called it a day.  Boy it sure was nice to get out there and get something new in the ground.  I'm glad I left the 1 bed empty, so that the next time I get the urge to plant I've got a whole bed ready for me!

Seed Starting in the recyclers garden

Winter is the time of year where all green gardeners spend a lot of time spent pouring over seed catalogs and day dreaming about how perfect next years garden can be.  New and interesting varieties of our favorite vegetables tempt us from the glossy pages.  As spring approaches, alot of us northern gardeners begin to calculate when to start our seedlings indoors to get some extra grow time in the garden.

I'm no exception.  I've been dreaming of rainbow colored swiss chard and white carrots along with purple tomatoes and basil (wouldn't that make an interesting pasta dish), but I may just go back to my tried, true and delicious varieties from years past.  Either way, I'm planning how to get some of these plants started early while still being friendly to the environment and my wallet.

Yesterday I was surfing around the internet and I found a great how to video to make your own seed starting pots from recycled newspaper.  Just be sure to use only the black and white section because the color printed papers can have heavy metals in the inks and you won't want that leaching into your food. 


You'll also want to use either a comercial organic potting soil, or your own mix.  I like to add some finished compost in just to give them a little kick start of nutrients.


Then once the first frost date has passed, harden off your little potted starts and just score the paper pot with a sharp knife to give the roots room to expand then plant pot and all into your organic garden.

Welcome 2010 an Earth odyssey

Here we are starting a new year and a new decade, and there's no better time to go green.  Here's a 7 simple steps you can take to make the coming 10 years and beyond better

1.  Change from high energy incandesent bulbs to compact florescent lighting.  An ENERGY STAR compact fluorescent light bulb (CFL) will save about $30 over its lifetime and pay for itself in about 6 months. It uses 75 percent less energy and lasts about 10 times longer than an incandescent bulb.  It's estimated by the EPA that each CFL bulb can keep 400 Lbs of greenhouse gasses from being released.  Just be sure you know how to dispose of them properly!  Here's what to do if you break a CFL

2.  Turn down your thermostat just a couple of degrees can save a significant amount of power.  Earth911.com estimates a 5% savings on your power bill for each degree you turn down the thermostat. 

3.  Be aware of packaging when making purchases.  So your standing in the grocery store trying to decide between 1 brand and another, do you consider packaging in your decision? Will you choose glass or aluminum over plastic?  Will you choose a refill?  Will you purchase in bulk to save on packaging?  It's a small thing that can make a big difference.  Here's an inovative and very friendly solution by the creative folks at  Ecovative Design

4.  Start a compost bin!  Your garden will grow greener and healthier and you'll save a lot of waste from hitting the landfills.  There are many designs for composters, here's how I made my "Easiest Compost Ever"

5.  Buy local and organic foods whenever possible.  You'll save jobs, help your local community, get fresher and healthier food and help to reduce the emissions that come from shipping over long distances.  Have you heard of the 100 mile diet?  They have a great getting started guide for eating local

6.  Reduce, Reuse and Recycle!  Simple yes, and makes a big impact.

7.  Plant a tree or have them planted by Arbor Day Foundation Just 6 pine trees at Twenty-Five year old absorb up to 1 ton of CO2.

African violets - propigation and care

I'm crazy for propigating plants.  When the works done in my outdoor garden, I turn to my indoor plants to get me through the gloomy days of winter.  Today I'm going to show you how I turned a handful of african violets into a growing collection!  This is a very easy way to increase your houseplants with little effort or cost.

For this project you will need:
     * a few fully mature african violet plants
     * 3-6 weeks time in sunny window
     * short jars or glasses
     * some small pots with saucers
     * good quality organic potting soil
     * pencil

This organic mix with worm casting and bat guano costs a little extra

but it's worth it when you see the blooms on these violets in winter

Remove a few of the healthy outer leaves from your mature plant.  You'll want to break them off cleanly and close to the main stem.  This is also a  good time to remove and compost any of the old faded flowers or leaves.

Here's one of my mature plants.  I'll remove the bottom leaves at the stem

Place the healthy leaves in a short jar or glass and add water to cover the bottom 1/3 or less of the stems.

A recycled artichoke jar is just the right size for this project!

Place your jar of leaves in a sunny window sill for 3 to 6 weeks.  Keep a close eye on the jar for newly forming roots.  Be sure to add water as needed, but don't overfill or you risk rotting your stems.  When adding water be careful not to get water on the furry leaves.  Remove and compost any of your leaves that begin to turn mushy at the stem.

When you begin to see small leaves or plantlets growing out of the base of your stems, it's time to pot up your new starts!

Fill your small pots with potting mix and pack down gently. Using a pencil, create a depression in the soil. Carefully seperate the leaves with attached roots and place your leaf in the depression.  Gently pack soil around the stem of the leaf. Be very careful that you don't break off the new plantlet from the leaf.

Here I've places several new starts in a single pot.  Once the new

growth reaches at least 1" I will seperate these into their own pots

Water your new start and place in a sunny window.  When the plantlet has grown to about 8 leaves of at least 1 inch high, you may cut back the original starter leaf.

This is a start I planted about 1 month ago. 

General care for your african violets:  

African violets require a medium to full light of a south facing window to bloom well.  They like to be kept humid, but not wet.  To keep up the humidity you can place a few saucers of water amongst your plants.

I can hardly wait for all these little beauties to bloom!

The biggest mistake when growing these plants is over watering.  It's best to water them from the bottom and allow the plant to draw up the moisture from the roots.

Another common mistake is water on the folliage, this will cause rot or brown spots on your plants.  You may however, spray a fine mist on them a few times per week. 

To get big beautiful blooms, you'll want to fertilize these plants about 1 x per month in the winter and 2 x per month in the summer. I was using worm tea from my worm bins, but found it's too smelly to use indoors.  You can purchase a specialized fertilizer for african violets at the nursery.

Mine usually bloom starting around Thanksgiving and continue all the way through early summer, then they rest and begin again in late fall. 

These delicate blooms last for several weeks

The best part about propigating your own houseplants is sharing!  I love to give gifts that are handmade or in this case homegrown.  These make really great hostess gifts and violets are especially appreciated when they are in the full glory of bloom!

Waiting for the frost and more green tomatoes

Beautiful Mount Baker and the sisters view  from the Lummi Island ferry dock 

Looking out at the fresh snow on Mount Baker is a good reminder that the first killing frost is not long off. Of course the trick is knowing when it will hit my garden and of that I'm not certain.

My neighbors a few miles down the road have all had a hard frost.  Not me! My garden seems to have a nice warm micro-climate this year.When I woke up yesterday morning and checked the temperature it was just dipping into the 30's at 39 degrees, still a lot of wiggle room for a hard freeze. But that little nippiness made me nervous.


Last week I posted about ripening some of my green tomatoes indoors.  At that time I harvested 1 box of fully developed green tomatoes and ripened those in my kitchen.  I still have 3 or 4 from that batch that are partially ripe and the rest have found their way into salsas, salads and tomato sandwiches.


This morning I felt was the right time to finish the harvest.  I had so many beautiful green tomatoes on my 5 remaining roma plants that I couldn't justify risking the frost taking a bite out of them.  With pruners in hand, I snatched up all the ones that looked fully developed and left only a few of the small weak ones on the plants.

Can you believe the loads of tomatoes still going in October? 

These Roma won't be as sweet as sun-ripened.

They will be better than store bought!

These tiny yellow pear tomatoes should be ready for topping

my autumn lettuce salad by next week

I've placed them all in shallow boxes with newspaper covers and added a ripened apple to assist the process.  I came away with 3 boxes of them!  What a fantastic harvest!

p.s - My dahlias are still blooming! 

What am I gonna do with all these little green tomatoes?

Pickling is a great way to preserve your

green end of season tiny tomatoes

We've had torrential rains for the last few days.  October in the Pacific Northwest is the wet cold season and now that the rains have started, there's no telling when they'll end. 

I still have 3 large yellow pear tomato plants in the garden that are producing. All this heavy rain is causing them to split as they ripen.  So today I went down and filled my pockets with tiny green tomatoes for pickling.  Then I grabbed the pruners and harvested a handful of anise flowers and oregeno from my organic herb bed along with about 8 garlic cloves that didn't get planted earlier this week.

Yellow pear tomatoes are about 1/2 the size of cherry tomatoes

When fully ripened they are a bright yellow, but these green ones

will be better pickled

Organic Anise flower from the boat garden

Garden fresh organic oregeno from the herb beds

These garlics didn't make the cut for planting but they will

compliment the small tomatoes for pickles

Back in the kitchen, I washed all of my items and pulled out the canning equiptment again.  First thing was to sterilize 4 quart jars and start the water to boil in the canner. 

In a seperate pot I brought these ingredients to a boil for the brine:

     *1 1/2 Quarts of white venegar

     *1 Cup sugar

     *1/3 Cup sea salt

As the brine was heating  I placed a pinch of mustard seed, corriander, and a few black pepper corns along with a few sprigs from the fresh herbs in the bottom of each jar.

No need to measure, just add a pinch to each jar

 Next I drained the tomatoes and packed them raw into the jars and added 2 cloves of peeled garlic in each jar.

So pretty!  The tomatoes and garlic cloves are the same size

Once the brine was boiled, I removed it from the heat and poured the hot liquid over the  tomatoes and herbs.  I left 1/2" of head room in the top of each jar and then added the lids and rings.  These went into a hot water bath canner at a boil for 10 minutes. Next I pulled the jars out and set on a towel on the counter where they will cool.

Pickling tiny tomatoes is quick and easy

Once they're cool I'll remove the rings, label the jars and place in the cupboard for at least 1 month.  After brining for a month these will be delicious little pickles and would make a nice garnish for bloody mary's or compliment any relish tray.

October garden: what's growing on?

With the bulk of my food preservation behind me, my thoughts turn back to my organic vegetable garden.  There are still a few veggies out there that will do fine up through the first frost.

 Now that the garden is sufficiently surrounded by netting, my carrots are starting to recover from their battle with the grazing deer. I hope to harvest them in November. 

I planted a new batch of lettuce about 3 weeks ago. Without the constant pruning by hungry deer this too is thriving!  It's going to be ready for a nice tender salad next week if the frost will hold off.

Tender tasty lettuce, the deer love it, but this batch is for me!

Some garden plants, like my everbearing strawberries, are self propigating.  I've got a nice patch growing in the bow of my boat garden.  With this years runners, there are about 12 new plants for next years berry season! The plants need very little coaxing to produce new plants.  All I had to do was arrange the runners so that the new florettes rooted in a suitable location.

Running on, these berries propigate themselves

The boat garden earlier this summer

Now that the weather has turned cool, it's time to get my spring bulbs in the ground.  I'm planning on a planting of daffodils and snow drops along with a  pot or 2 of tulips that will have to be protected from those deer.  I'll head into the nursery on Monday and pick them out.  Hopefully I can get my hands on some daffodil bulbs from Skagit Valley.

Skagit Valley daffodils spring 2009

 Flowers aren't the only bulbs that benefit from a fall planting.  It's also a good time to get next years garlic crop in the ground.  Garlic planted in autumn usually is ready for harvest a little earlier in the summer than spring planted cloves.

I have a basket full of garlic that I harvested in early September.  Because I use a frugal garden technique of planting the inner cloves of my kitchen garlic, some of the harvest was still a bit to small to use.  It was time to get those back in the ground where they will benefit from another couple seasons of growth.

A tisket a tasket a garlic bulb filled basket

Planting garlic cloves is just like planting any small bulb flower.  You'll want to pick a spot in your garden with nice loamy soil.  Space them 4-6" apart and about 2-3" deep.

small garden, no problem! Found enough room for 30 garlics!

I chose this nearly empty bed for my planting.  At the far end you can see I still have some celery growing here that I plan to over winter.  I use a square foot garden method because I have limited garden beds.  Using this technique, I planted some garlic amid the celery plants.

Garlic will grow well interplanted with many other veggies

I dug out 3 rows deep across my 18" wide beds.  This allowed me to get the most plants per square foot. 

It's easy to dig in this nice loamy garden soil

I chose my heartiest bulbs from the basket and set them in the holes.  It's important to plant them with the rooting side down!  Then I covered them with about 2" of soil and packed it down with my hands.  No need to add extra compost this time because this bed was already amended when I harvested the beans that had been growing here.  On that note, be sure to rotate your garden plants from year to year.  This will help reduce the chances of transfering any diseases that may be soil born.

From this tiny bulb I look forward to salsas stews and pestos for next year

Normally at this step I would water the bulbs in, but there was no need with a rainy weekend in the forecast.

Echo the eco-dog came to lend a paw.

Or maybe he just needed a hand with that toy?

That was easy!  Now I'll just let mother nature do her work.  The bulbs will start to root immediately and grow throughout the fall, winter and spring.  They should be ready to harvest at the start of next summer!

I'm sure going to miss my garden over the winter, but I'll get through those dreary months knowing that is still some action just below the soil.

Last chance tomatoes - fall garden clean up

I've been a mad pruner this week!  It's fall and time to clean up the garden before it gets too soggy out there.  I've got garden beds running around our house, throughout the backyard and of course my new organic vegetable garden too.  There's no shortage of work to be done. And no small amount of pruned vegetation to deal with.

I try to compost everything I can so that I can use the finished compost in the spring to fertilize my planting beds, but this year I had a lot of brush that needed to be pruned back.  This amounted to 2 full burn piles!  I'm looking forward to later this weekend having some small bon fires and getting this clean up behind me.  I might even make some smores!  mmmmmmmmm

One of my pruning burn piles

My favorite thing about vegetable gardening are my vine ripe tomatoes.  I'm monitoring the temperature each night to try to harvest them before they get bitten by frost.

My tomato plants, especially the romas,  are still full of green ones.  So far I've been extremely lucky and no frost has laid down on my yard.  Most of the gardeners that I know both here on the island and over on the mainland have already experienced their first killing frost.

Today I checked on my green tomatoes.  Those that were full size I harvested along with a section of tomato plant.  I'm going to try my grandmothers method and finish ripening them indoors. 

This green beefsteak will not have enough time to ripen on the vine

To ripen season end green tomatoes like grandma did, I cut a 4 to 6" branch connected to the green tomato, place in a single layer in a cardboard box, place one ripe apple in the same box, cover with newspaper and place in a room temperature area in the house.  I'm keeping my box atop of the refridgerator. 

Here's my yellow plum tomatoes, you can see there's still a lot of green ones!

Todays harvest

Each day, check on your tomatoes.  Use them as soon as they are ripe and toss any that turn brown or become too soft into your compost bin. 

I've pruned a lot of the foliage and the tops of my tomato plants to encourage the energy of the plant to go into developing and ripening the fruits. 

One thing I never compost is tomato plant and foliage.  The reason for this, composted tomato foliage can carry blight and the blight organism is not killed in the composting process.  Instead, to be sure not to spread disease to next years tomatoes, I am placing the foliage and stems in the burn pile.  No sense in taking a chance of spreading disease from season to season.

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Fall Garden Clean Up Craft

Here in the Pacific Northwest we have 4 seasons Winter, warm and wet, summer, cold and wet.  This year we've been enjoying an unusually dry autumn and so I've been putting off my outdoor chores in favor of my canning projects.

After hearing the forcast for rain to come later this week, I thought it would be a good time to get out in the yard while it was still dry. I grabbed my gloves and pruning shears and started cutting back this summers growth.  I have a large garden area in my yard full of herbs and flowering perennials. Because I live on a rocky hillside, I have to choose plants that can thrive in the limiting and sometimes difficult soil conditions.

One flowering perennial I've been placing up the hillside is called pearly everlasting (Anaphalis margaritacea). It's a native plant in the aster family and seems to thrive where soil conditions are poor.  It's not a super showy flower, but it blooms in large clusters and stays in bloom from about July - October.  As the name implys this flower is great for drying and lasts nearly forever once dried.

Today I made a wreath from the pearly everlasting that I was cutting back.  Here's how to make one of your own.

For this project you will need a grapevine wreath form.  You can easily make one with your own grapevines by winding them into a circular form and interlocking the ends.  You will also need a pair of scissors, some wire, wire cutters and a whole lot of cut pearly everlasting.  I filled this garden bench twice with plant matter.

After you've gathered your materials, you will take small handfulls of the flower and strip the leaves off the stems.

Then using your wire, wrap this cluster around the grapevine wreath and pull the wire tight.

Then you'll need to trim off the excess stems.

Keep working your way around the wreath in the same direction. 

Add another cluster of flowers, wrap in wire and trim excess stem, be sure to overlap the flower clusters over the previous clusters stems to form a full and lush wreath.

When you've filled the wreath form, secure the wire to the grapevine and make a loop in the wire on the back of the wreath for hanging.

The white wreath is quite nice on it's own, but I also had some hydrangeas in bloom, so I added some to the wreath for extra interest.  You can use other flowers too or decorate with rosehips or anything else you can imagine.

This is my finished wreath.  It turned out beautiful and looks great at our front entry. 

Green tip for this project:  Place your trimmings, leafs and stems into the compost bin and by next spring the compost you create can feed your new garden flowers.

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