Applestar's 2016 Garden

[applestar]

Harvested more garlic. (Elephant and Giant Russian Marble Purple Striped)



The SFHX garlic•onion•shallot bed is almost empty now and Butta squash is starting to fruit -- hand pollinated a 2nd female blossom today -- so it can take over the middle of the bed as intended. Timing is working out well. There are a couple of what I'm thinking are rutabagas growing here as well as a few of the old dill seeds I scattered.

And there are at least four very nicely bulking onions here -- you can see a couple of them to the right... The others are on the other side of the squash. I finally consulted my notes from spring planting, and those are "Onion last year's runts•sets" I didn't ID the variety but I think these are Walla Walla.

The onions along the left edge of the bed are from seeds I started in late winter.

[applestar]

Butta F1 Yellow Zucchini Summer Squash Seeds | DP Seeds Commercial Hybrid Vegetable Seed Company
https://www.dpseeds.com/node/109

Color/Shape:
Light lemon yellow with slight stem ridges.
Maturity:
45 days.
Tolerances:
Has shown tolerance to several podi viruses.
Features:
Butta F1 is a hybrid, yellow zucchini squash. Unbelievably uniform, this cream colored zucchini does not show the scaring that darker varieties exhibit. Blocky, long fruit cut to a nice ivory-white flesh—a striking package when boxed. This will be an excellent addition to any squash growers program.

-- I picked up the seeds repackaged under Agway brand on a whim without knowing anything about it. Looking at the official description, it's a bit worrisome that they make NO mention of flavor at all....

[applestar]

SPIRAL GARDEN UPDATE --

I know -- I just posted a picture of my Spiral Garden a few days ago, right? Well, you gotta keep up! Most of my garden beds are intensively grown with continuous and generally overlapping succession of plants throughout the season. I spend my winter and early spring months couch-potato gardening and planning the logistics and crop rotations for all this.



I trimmed off all the older leaves from the June bearing and even most of the day neutral Seascape strawberries in the Inner Spiral. They were starting to show some signs of fungal spots, but I matted them in the swale/path as mulch anyway

When I was able to see the mulched ground of the mounded spiral bed, I spread some organic fertilizer, lightly worked that in so as not to disturb the strawberry crowns, and sowed pre-soaked/germinated melon seeds in the widest available spots.

I soaked those melon seeds overnight two days ago. By yesterday afternoon, Apple Melon was already germinating, and White Honewydew wasn't far behind. Today, one of the Sugar Baby seeds had germinated. I'm late planting melons because --- to be honest -- I TOTALLY forgot! So I don't know if they will have enough time to grow and mature, but at least they will have a couple of days of heat wave in the 90's with heat index in the 100+ to hurry them up and out of their seeds and sprouting out of the ground.

[applestar]

I weeded and fertilized the SFHX and planted all the remaining rooted slips of Korean and Japanese sweet potatoes. One deep 4x4 container had overwintered Japanese sweet potato vine in it, and there were tiny peanut-sized sweet potatoes crowded in the bottom of the container.... I hope they will grow some more.



The flattened plastic mulch and potting mix bags are going to cover at least the perimeter of the bed once the onions and shallots and the last two garlic come out. I guess you are supposed to use black ones, but these are what I had handy. My plan is to layer white/opaque one on the soil and then top with transparent layer to trap heat. (Do you think that would be too much?)

I'm also hoping the white under the Butta yellow zuke will help confuse the pests.


...after all that work, these berries were wonderful to snack on ...

[applestar]

Here's a mystery cross -- out of Kakai hulless squash seed. Kakai seeds are GREEN with no seed shell/hull so there's not much chance that I confused it with another seed when I seedzipped the pre-germinated seed. But it's growing a pale yellow elongated fruit, faintly striped instead of the typical dark green immature fruit.



Kakai is a C.pepo so it could have crossed with Yellow crookneck. I'm half tempted to pick it immature and try tasting it, and I think I would if I didn't have FOUR plants of Butta yellow zucchini plants poised to pump out fruits.

As it is, C.pepo is bounds to be taken down by SVB's early so I'd rather gamble on letting this first fruit mature so I can see if the seeds have hulls or not. I wonder if hulless trait is dominant or recessive?

[applestar]

Yay! First female cucumber flower buds -- these are on H-19 Littleleaf

[Lindsaylew82]

WOOHOO! You planted the apple melon! I think you should have enough time.

We have late plantings of Petit Gris de Renne melons! I'm hoping to get a few! They are just starting to get really vine-y. Male flowers just today, but they're only about a foot in length.

The apple melons have been slow to fruit, but now that they're fruiting, they're putting in heavy, sort of like Cukes. I'm very eager to see what they are. They look like smooth little footballs right now. I hope they at least stay small, they're climbing vigorously!

[applestar]

Subject: chick peas/garbanzo beans

I started harvesting some of the chickpeas. A tiny baby bunny has found a vulnerability in the garden fencing -- adults are excluded -- and has been making its way around here and there. Some of the chickpeas closest to where the bunny is getting in has been munched. Found that dried stalk on the ground for example and a few others in tiny bits including empty pods.

It's been dry, and getting hot, but we have had some rain and I have accidentally flooded the beds once or twice. The pods are filling out but 1 in every 10 plants have yellowed and wilted -- and looking back to Jai_ganesha's tips, it's probably too much water.

Pods are like air bladders, and the wilted ones are empty, immature ones are full of air but soft. I picked ones that felt firm shelled, and in most cases hard with the pea I could feel inside. Most of these had one pea each, though s few contained a 2nd less mature pea also.



I squeezed and popped the pods open without extracting the peas, then put them (along with some broccoli side shoots and leaves) in the hot water after cooking and scooping out farfalle pasta. After they had turned bright dark green, I cooled and extracted the chickpeas from their pods, and added with the broccoli florets, peeled stalks and side leaves to a tuna-pasta salad. They were yummy

[applestar]

Female cucumber flowers are starting to show up! I missed the one of the right yesterday. Hopefully, the pollinators did not.



...and these two Apple Melons were first up! Really good seeds @lindsay!

[Lindsaylew82]

Ours are showing signs of powdery mildew after last nights monsoon...I will have to be vigilant about keeping it managed if I want any melons and I SO badly want these to fruit!

[applestar]

I left you a comment about spraying them in your garden thread Lindsay

*My* baby bunny has somehow made his way all the way to the other side of the house -- or else it's a littermate maybe -- and got inside the rabbit fence enclosure of the Family Room•Rice Paddy beds. A bunch of Adzuki bean plants that were just starting to flower have been sampled. It keeps hiding under the strawberry leaves -- I'm tempted to scalp those as well.

I lectured him/her about eating dandelions and chick weeds and NOT eating my beans -- I have edamame starting to poke up above the strawberries -- and later on, I saw from the FR window that it was eating red clover along the edge of the enclosure from the TOP OF A HILLED MINI-POTATO PATCH MOUND, then hopped right out from this handy accessible height through an UPPER, WIDER OPENING between the wires of the rabbit wire fence.

I will need to keep the rice paddy filled because gardener's who grow rice in upland/dry beds have said that rabbits LOVE rice foliage. There are also overwintered carrots that I'm letting go to flower to attract a certain type of Garden Patrol for Japanese beetle control, as well as some broccoli that are still looking amazingly nice (this is messing up my succession plans for those areas, but I might let them grow on and make seeds and stop harvesting the side shoots... These are most likely diCicco.)

[applestar]

There are TWO of them. One in the SFH eating carrot and beet greens, sweet potato vines, and venturing out to the spiral garden to eat adzuki beans and chickpeas. I found a dill chomped and on the ground -- maybe it didn't like the flavor. Basils are still standing but I'm remembering a friend with a pampered pet rabbit said her bunny loves basil so she grows a whole bunch of them....

The other one is back in the FR•Rice Paddy garden as described above.

[applestar]

Back in Sun Jun 16, 2013 4:18 am

I need a 2nd plant for my hazelnut which blooms every year but doesn't produce nuts.

I did get a 2nd plant from a different source (well my SIL got it for me) in spring of 2014. It didn't bloom the first year, but did start to bloom last year a little bit, and fast forward to this year.... TA DAH!!!!




...I SO LOVE mornings when there is a brand new surprise discovery in the garden, and this one was one of them

At first I only saw one and was super excited. But I also discovered that the Japanese beetles are already here -- they are attracted to the American Hazel more than anything else except the sweet Cherry. They congregate on the hazel leaves in triple stacked orgies and make lacework out of them. So I decided to bag the first developing hazelnut I found.

Since I'm already out of extra bags, I had to harvest some blackberries and blueberries to re-allocate. I freed three bags, came back, and almost immediately found a second nut packet and then a third. I said to myself, OK that was NOT normal. Since I found three developing nuts too easily, there's bound to be one more and I must be short one bag.... And yep, found the 4th one, went back for another bag, came back to bag it, and found the fifth ... of course.

[applestar]

Today's harvest included the first Butta yellow zuke along with some carrots -- it's a challenge to find good ones now as some only have stubble of greens....

[lakngulf]

I just never did well with carrots. I would pull 10 and only a couple would have a decent root.

[applestar]

Is that related to your soil-bourne disease issues? Have you tried growing in the tub with tomatoes? I planted my carrots with peas this year, and they seemed to be good companions. Now the peas are done and vines have been sharp-yanked to leave the roots and root nodules in the soil.

[applestar]

Today


Blueberries were not photo'd -- DD's ate them all.

[applestar]

Subject: Applestar's 2016 Tomatoes (& peppers & eggplants)

I'm having problems with tortoise beetle infestation in the potato foliage. These two beds were pretty badly affected, and the potato foliage had been demolished, so I decided to pull the plug and put the beds to good use.

I'd already robbed some of the tubers before -- harvested this much more today:


Planted the remaining hot pepper seedlings here where it's NOT fenced, hot and dry:

(Maui Purple, Fish, Czech Black, and Hanoi Market were overwintered from 2015)

...and remaining sweet peppers here in the Sunflower & House where it is tree-shaded in the morning and tends to be more watered:

... Of course I found two more that I forgot to plant ...

...so, that means I planted the pepper seedlings elsewhere and this didn't happen, though I did plant the sweet potatoes as planned.

More garlic harvest sitting in front of a fan on standard size webtray turned upside down.



One full-size elephant garlic...I think I'll dig up the rest in couple of days. Thinking of planting sweet potatoes in the SFHX bed and rest of the pepper seedlings in the Outer Apple Guild bed after the garlic are harvested.

Apple Guild garlic harvest has been delayed because we had some rain and the ground there was still so wet. I need to build up both inner and outer Apple guild beds so they are raised mounds >> more compost and fall leaves this winter... OR since I have to come up with an alternate crop to plant after the garlic is harvested... Maybe some kind of cover crop? The outer Apple guild is tricky because it doesn't have a protective rabbit fence.

What late summer-fall crop can be planted here without rabbits munching on them? All I can think of are nots -- not beans, not peas, not greens, not broccoli/cauliflower, not carrots, not beets.... Hmm I just had an idea -- broccoli, etc. need to be sown/grown under protective insect tunnel so that might protect them. I did think about trying fall-sown onions here, but do I want to follow garlic with onions?

[sweetiepie]

I always love seeing your garden photos. You do wonders in such a little space. Sorry no idea about the rabbits. I have a fence around mine but am now fighting pocket gophers. Terrible little creatures, just like on the cartoons, sucking your plants down from under ground. Anyway back on topic, love your garden pictures.

[applestar]

I want to show you my West Garden Gate

-- I realized the Triple Crown blackberry canes grow long enough to be like a "climbing" rose, so I decided to let it climb over the arch trellis.

View from inside the garden and from the driveway:

[applestar]

Harvested the Outer Apple Guild garlic. This is about the best condition to harvest. You can see how firmly the garlic roots have grown into the clay (there was at least one earthworm in each rootball of the garlic ). If I let the soil dry more, I would have to chip away at the clay. Absolutely no way I could harvest garlic by pulling on the top.

[nltaff]

OOooh, lovely arch over the gate! Love the pathway approaching the gate. Inviting for a slow stroll down the path, and it looks so protected and...cozy.

[applestar]

Something has been eating the chickpeas. I was blaming the baby bunny but I managed to exclude it from the Spiral Garden enclosure -- this morning it was dashing around under the Ostrich Fern -- but just now out of the upstairs window, I saw the real culprit ... A chipmunk climbing around on the chickpea foliage

Tomorrow our indoor kitties are going to have a rare garden exercise hour ...not that I expect them to catch it, but to leave their scent all over the garden.

[applestar]

Some random photos....

Spiral Garden and Sunflower House area



All the melons are up and growing. Only one of the unlabeled saved large watermelon seeds seem to have made it but it looks like it's a MOON AND STARS!



I actually did this a couple of days ago, but waited for the pruned foliage to dry up to take pictures -- I opened up the skyview and airspace as well as shrubby growth along the fence behind the Spiral Garden. I felt the cucumbers needed a bit more sun and airflow to avoid getting fungal issues. The Highbush cranberry viburnum nudum "Winterthur" needed it, too, so it can hurry up and grow up to replace some of the ROS. Removing excess ROS sucker growths and exposing the white fence made the area brighter from reflected light as well. All the mulberry and Rose of Sharon clippings went on the ground as mulch.




Today's harvest including 2nd harvest of ready to dry Marrowfat soup peas

[lakngulf]

Looking good!

[Toxic1979]

You certainly keep very busy in the garden, and all the hard work definitely shows.

[applestar]

Thank you!

[applestar]

Mine is definitely a backyard garden. I do like that we have fresh harvest of something practically every day, even if it's small quantity

TL: First fig among blackberries, a strawberry, and some tea Jasmine blossoms
TR: baby and young carrot thinnings, Hari eggplant, Butta zucchini, chickpeas
BR: ...these onions are kind of runty...

BL: ...these are the last of the soup peas -- Blauschokker Blue. Between these and the two Marrowfat harvests, there should be enough for some soup. ...but I'm finding it hard to really grow enough quantities of peas, so fresh or dried, home grown peas are only special treats. I have renewed respect for those frozen bags of peas we have been casually buying and consuming....

I AM going to try growing some for fall harvest this year.

[applestar]

I found onion maggots just starting to burrow into some of the onions today. I was out there peeling all outer layers and rinsing off the maggots from these. The necks had already collapsed on them. The maggots were tiny, some just hatched, and not far into the onions yet.

I think I'm gonna pull the biggest best ones in the next couple of days and process them for freezing. I don't even want try to cure/store them -- inspecting every single one and cutting out any iffy parts.

[Toxic1979]

If it helps at all... they look real tasty!

[applestar]

Thanks so much I think they will be fine once cleaned up and then frozen for taking out and cooking. I've been told that it's best to vacuum seal them in useful portions to minimize onion odor permeating throughout the freezer.

````

- These are the last three Giant Russian Marble Purple Striped from SFHX -- I keep saying last garlic... then remember more that I forgot to dig up -- price of planting them here and there

- A blue pail half full of blackberries this morning, but they looked more impressive in the wire colander after rinsing I believe this is a little more than a quart -- maybe 3 pints. I gave 1 qt to my parents

- I harvested some more onions. These had bent necks but not entirely collapsed yet. Some just hatched maggots in some of them, and others with marks where I believe eggs might have been oviposited. I cut those parts away. Two good sized Butta zucchini. The plants are loaded with female blossoms, but I'm not counting my eggs. SVB's and leaf-foots are here.

- one of Maid of Orleans Arabian Jasmine has been loaded with blossoms every morning. I'm continuing to put the fresh blossoms in with my 1/2 full special canister of organic green tea from Japan in the freezer. As of this morning, the canister is full, so I'm going to have to start forcing fresh blossoms in, crumbling the frozen blossoms, OR move them to a larger container....

[Toxic1979]

The blackberries look so good! I'm not sure if they'd grow up here... wish they would!

...I'm thinking a blackberry cobbler! mmmm

[applestar]

Hmm... I can't remember what it's called, but there is a species of viburnum that ONLY grows up your way in the north, and according to a well known wild forager, it's the best tasting out of all the viburnums. I always wanted to try it, but of course right at this moment I can't remember what it's called....


...I looked up some blackberry cobbler recipes...

[applestar]

Blackberries blushing on the front side of the fence between garage and West Garden Gate.


Onions on picnic table bench and cleaned and ready to bring inside in a 2 gal bucket
(I'm satisfied with doing it this way but... those dratted onion fly maggots (grumble ) )

-- These are Ailsa Craig, Red Torpedo Tropea, and WallaWalla.
Ringmaster White Spanish are not ready, though I may HAVE to pull them anyway.
They were mostly planted as transplants on 4/17)



Started a nursery seedbed patch of mixed brassicas under a pop up mesh protector

[applestar]

Kandy Korn x Glass Gem F1 in the itty bitty VGB bed are going bananas.



...due to the tight space and crowded conditions, only three stalks seem to be growing to their potential, but these three each have three silks emerging per stalk.
They are way too tall for me to attemp hand pollinating. Contenting myself with shaking the stalks and flapping the tassles. The runty stalks have their purpose though, they are just the right height to flap the tassles at the lowest silks.

In the Sunflower House, Kandy Korn x Glass Gem F1 are the tallest in the front-right quadrant of the bed. Here, I'm collecting pollen from any tassles I can reach and pollinating any silks I fancy, though I mostly concentrate on silks on the outmost stalks as well as secondary silks low down on the stalks and blocked by overlapping leaves.

__first Mirai 350BC cobs are almost ready

__the Mirai 350BC which were the first to start silking are completely "contaminated" in the secondary silks. Haha. I'll probably randomly save a couple of these to mature and see what kind of seed kernels I get.

[applestar]

[applestar]

Stinkbugs are HERE En Parade -- Harlequin on broccoli, Green on corn silk, Leaffoot or Squashbug on cucumber, Brown Marmorated on blackberry ...

[applestar]

Rice paddy is doing well -- good tillers forming. I need to hoe between the rice clumps again to keep the weed pressure down.

This year, there are only a few of these imposters -- Japanese millet that look exactly like the rice except for the tell-tale red stem base (I pulled those out right after taking the photos )

[applestar]

Harvest updates


(Duplicate vegs, one photo with cucumbers, etc. one with fig and onion)





...yeah 3 Butta zucchini plants pumping them out now...

[applestar]

...tried a different kind of collage today...