Cucumbers - taking over the garden. Should have given them more space. Had a cucumber salad the other day with our first one - delicious!
Peppers - Really producing, 95% of them doing fantastic, a few that I still can't tell if they're going to pull through.
Zucchini - the yellow squash really faltered and still hasn't really recovered. The light green variety I planted from seed died, but I replanted it about a week ago and now I've got three little sprouts. I'm hoping with these temps they catch up soon!
Tomatoes - first Juliet is almost ripe! Hopefully more will follow soon.
Green beans - producing like crazy. We have 2.5 pounds just from the last few days. Will need to look into canning them.
Eggplant - getting established. Not expecting big things any time soon.
Melon - Really taking off, but no little melons yet.
Winter squash - not doing much, I'm hoping with the heat it'll perk up soon.
Onions - almost entirely harvested - only about 10 left, but we have at least 15-25 at home still.
Carrots and beets - still quite a few left, will need to pick soon (but we still have carrots in the fridge!).
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Showing posts with label melon. Show all posts
Showing posts with label melon. Show all posts
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Friday, June 5, 2009
Garden update - shallots, bermuda grass, new plants
I picked the shallots on Saturday, May 30. While a few were mushy, most of them were nice and firm. I feel really lucky about that ... whew! I'm either going to braid them (which doesn't seem as straightforward as braiding garlic), or I'll just do what I did last year and let them dry in some mesh bags hanging in the closet.
I finally had it with the bermuda grass (which I lamented last week). I spent hours on Monday and Tuesday after work digging the stuff out, even around the tomato plants as carefully as I could. It was back-breaking work, but I think I got about 90-95% of it, and I'm determined to start catching it again as soon as I see it. I might even pull out my parsley so I can get rid of what's hiding in there, and then start over.
The only problem is my neighbor, who has tons of bermuda grass in the corner right by the common border we share. I can't do anything about that, but I'm considering buying a big piece of plywood or something similar (and cheap), digging a trench (oh my poor back), and planting that thing in there. I figure one foot below ground and one foot above should stop that grass from coming over. It might come around, but at least I'll limit my vulnerability.
And last - I've planted some more stuff! New plants include two types of melon (ambrosia melon and a variety of Israeli melon - maybe Ogen?), butternut squash, yellow patty pan squash, my zucchini genovese that I grew from seed (2), two black beauty eggplants, and two rosa bianca eggplants. I'm pretty much done with my summer planting, yay!
Oh yeah, and after all that digging and weeding and planting, I did some mulching. I'm essentially mulching only the area around and between the winter squash and melons, since it won't be watered, will supress weeds (I hope) and provide a nice place for the melons and squash to hang out while they grow on their vines.
Here's my garden diagram:
I finally had it with the bermuda grass (which I lamented last week). I spent hours on Monday and Tuesday after work digging the stuff out, even around the tomato plants as carefully as I could. It was back-breaking work, but I think I got about 90-95% of it, and I'm determined to start catching it again as soon as I see it. I might even pull out my parsley so I can get rid of what's hiding in there, and then start over.
The only problem is my neighbor, who has tons of bermuda grass in the corner right by the common border we share. I can't do anything about that, but I'm considering buying a big piece of plywood or something similar (and cheap), digging a trench (oh my poor back), and planting that thing in there. I figure one foot below ground and one foot above should stop that grass from coming over. It might come around, but at least I'll limit my vulnerability.
And last - I've planted some more stuff! New plants include two types of melon (ambrosia melon and a variety of Israeli melon - maybe Ogen?), butternut squash, yellow patty pan squash, my zucchini genovese that I grew from seed (2), two black beauty eggplants, and two rosa bianca eggplants. I'm pretty much done with my summer planting, yay!
Oh yeah, and after all that digging and weeding and planting, I did some mulching. I'm essentially mulching only the area around and between the winter squash and melons, since it won't be watered, will supress weeds (I hope) and provide a nice place for the melons and squash to hang out while they grow on their vines.
Here's my garden diagram:
Friday, May 29, 2009
Overrun by weeds
I'm struggling with the weeds this year, more than ever before, it seems. Bermuda grass, in particular, is a scourge I wish I could eliminate entirely from the garden. It's driving me nuts, and I don't think I'll be able to dig it out this summer for fear of damaging the roots of my tomatoes. I might settle with getting out as much as possible, then putting down a nice layer of mulch. If only I can figure out what kind of mulch to use.
I still have to plant zucchini, eggplant, winter squash, and melon. I'm hoping to do it tomorrow, after a big session of weeding and mulching.
I finally built my little tomato watering system, although I'm not sure how great it works. I did get a T-joint, found my old tubing and cut it in half, and ran a line into each channel. It seems to water a little slowly - to get a good deep watering, I think I'll have to let it run several hours, which isn't always possible. The tomato plants are looking fantastic, though - some already have some small green tomatoes! I'm busy pruning and staking and tying the vines, and Loris even said that they don't look completely out of control yet, which is always a good thing =)
Everything else is doing great:
1.We've picked most of the lettuce because of the hot temps.
2. The peas didn't produce because I planted them too late.
3. The peppers are mostly doing extremely well, except one or two that didn't pull through the heat.
4. The green beans look fantastic.
5. Radishes are almost done, and the flavor is getting too strong because of the heat.
6. Carrots are coming along well, and I'm harvesting regularly, although a few have developed hard, woody centers.
7. The leeks mostly went to seed, so I pulled them and will make do with the edible parts.
8. Spinach bolted - I have no luck with spinach.
9. The basil suffered from the heat, but is now rallying well.
10. Ditto for the cukes - I might replace one of them.
11. Onions - yum! They're still not really drying out, and a few have put up seed stalks, but we picked one and are slowly eating it fresh in salads.
12. Garlic - looks good, but I haven't dug it up yet to see. It's probably ready any day now.
One exception - shallots. I pulled a few, and the bulbs were all mushy. Not sure what's wrong, but it makes me very sad. =(
Next time: Decisions on mulch, garden update, and hopefully some pics
I still have to plant zucchini, eggplant, winter squash, and melon. I'm hoping to do it tomorrow, after a big session of weeding and mulching.
I finally built my little tomato watering system, although I'm not sure how great it works. I did get a T-joint, found my old tubing and cut it in half, and ran a line into each channel. It seems to water a little slowly - to get a good deep watering, I think I'll have to let it run several hours, which isn't always possible. The tomato plants are looking fantastic, though - some already have some small green tomatoes! I'm busy pruning and staking and tying the vines, and Loris even said that they don't look completely out of control yet, which is always a good thing =)
Everything else is doing great:
1.We've picked most of the lettuce because of the hot temps.
2. The peas didn't produce because I planted them too late.
3. The peppers are mostly doing extremely well, except one or two that didn't pull through the heat.
4. The green beans look fantastic.
5. Radishes are almost done, and the flavor is getting too strong because of the heat.
6. Carrots are coming along well, and I'm harvesting regularly, although a few have developed hard, woody centers.
7. The leeks mostly went to seed, so I pulled them and will make do with the edible parts.
8. Spinach bolted - I have no luck with spinach.
9. The basil suffered from the heat, but is now rallying well.
10. Ditto for the cukes - I might replace one of them.
11. Onions - yum! They're still not really drying out, and a few have put up seed stalks, but we picked one and are slowly eating it fresh in salads.
12. Garlic - looks good, but I haven't dug it up yet to see. It's probably ready any day now.
One exception - shallots. I pulled a few, and the bulbs were all mushy. Not sure what's wrong, but it makes me very sad. =(
Next time: Decisions on mulch, garden update, and hopefully some pics
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Garden update - end of June
It's the last week of June, and things are looking pretty good. Here’s a rundown on the garden:
1. Cucumber – really great, we’ve had 4 cukes so far and they’re all delicious. These are pickling cukes, so I could pickle some, but I have to check and see how many jars we still have from last year. We don’t eat a whole lot of pickles normally.
2. Melon – doing fantastic for now! We have two melons about the size of a baseball. Unfortunately, they’re starting to climb the leeks that I haven’t gotten out of the ground yet. I’ll have to take care of that this weekend.
3. Basil – growing quickly. We still have frozen pesto from last year, so I’m not really sure what I’m going to do with it yet (except make liquor!).
4. Sauce tomatoes – the roma tomatoes are doing very well, we have a lot of green tomatoes so far and they’re growing nicely. I’m doing my best to keep them trained to the stakes, and it’s going decently well. I think these varieties are a bushier variety and training them to stakes may not be the way to go. Some of them are climbing the stakes pretty well, but others aren’t. I can’t help wondering if I’m accidentally limiting the harvest by pruning them or not. I have to learn more about it.
5. Heirloom tomatoes – 5 plants now have little green tomatoes! Woohoo! The last one doesn’t – it’s a beefsteak, which I’ve read don’t do that well in Sacramento because it’s slightly too hot here. We’re having a spate of slightly cooler days now, so I’m hoping it will set fruit. I’m so excited about slicing into our first heirloom tomatoes.
6. Peppers – I can’t remember if I posted that I planted 6 MORE pepper plants. I believe I now have 36 plants (plus one spicy pepper for Loris). A bunch of them have pretty good-sized peppers on them now – I’m quite happy with how it’s going.
7. Zucchini – We’ve had 5-6 good-sized zucchini so far and they keep coming. Yum!
8. Shallots – I dug up one bunch and they were delicious. It seemed like they’re still dividing. I don’t know how/if I should store them, so the others are still in the ground.
9. Beets – doing well – see previous post(s)
10. Lima beans – Just planted, June 22. Total experiment – let’s see how it goes!
11. Green beans – are doing extremely well. Most of them have grown big and bushy, and we’ve had enough to make a big green bean and potato salad, with another big batch in the fridge.
12. Yellow summer squash – this seemed to suffer after I planted it, but now it’s picked up and doing pretty well. I expect it to start producing any day now.
13. Carrots – Doing well, but they’re also sort of “unwrapping” the outside layer from the core. They’re still edible, but they look awfully funny. I didn’t do the best job of thinning them, so I’m not sure if that’s part of it or not. They do seem to be too close together.
14. Eggplant – The four original ones I planted are getting big and starting to flower. I think we’ll have some eggplant when we get back from Italy, if not before. The last one, which I just planted within the last month, had a hard time after transplanting, but seems to finally be perking up. Whew.
15. Parsley – Growing quickly into bushes. Hopefully I didn’t plant too much! We’ll be making a lot of bagnet this year, I hope.
16. Leeks – are flowering. Not good. They’re forming a woody center stalk, which makes them difficult if not impossible to eat. I have to get them out of the ground to salvage what I can. They do have beautiful flowers at least. They never got big like the ones you buy at the store. Loris says it’s because they’re too close together. Honestly, I’m not sure they’re worth the trouble. I can see lining the border of a bed with them, but dedicating a whole space to them is probably not the way to go. We just don’t need that many.
1. Cucumber – really great, we’ve had 4 cukes so far and they’re all delicious. These are pickling cukes, so I could pickle some, but I have to check and see how many jars we still have from last year. We don’t eat a whole lot of pickles normally.
2. Melon – doing fantastic for now! We have two melons about the size of a baseball. Unfortunately, they’re starting to climb the leeks that I haven’t gotten out of the ground yet. I’ll have to take care of that this weekend.
3. Basil – growing quickly. We still have frozen pesto from last year, so I’m not really sure what I’m going to do with it yet (except make liquor!).
4. Sauce tomatoes – the roma tomatoes are doing very well, we have a lot of green tomatoes so far and they’re growing nicely. I’m doing my best to keep them trained to the stakes, and it’s going decently well. I think these varieties are a bushier variety and training them to stakes may not be the way to go. Some of them are climbing the stakes pretty well, but others aren’t. I can’t help wondering if I’m accidentally limiting the harvest by pruning them or not. I have to learn more about it.
5. Heirloom tomatoes – 5 plants now have little green tomatoes! Woohoo! The last one doesn’t – it’s a beefsteak, which I’ve read don’t do that well in Sacramento because it’s slightly too hot here. We’re having a spate of slightly cooler days now, so I’m hoping it will set fruit. I’m so excited about slicing into our first heirloom tomatoes.
6. Peppers – I can’t remember if I posted that I planted 6 MORE pepper plants. I believe I now have 36 plants (plus one spicy pepper for Loris). A bunch of them have pretty good-sized peppers on them now – I’m quite happy with how it’s going.
7. Zucchini – We’ve had 5-6 good-sized zucchini so far and they keep coming. Yum!
8. Shallots – I dug up one bunch and they were delicious. It seemed like they’re still dividing. I don’t know how/if I should store them, so the others are still in the ground.
9. Beets – doing well – see previous post(s)
10. Lima beans – Just planted, June 22. Total experiment – let’s see how it goes!
11. Green beans – are doing extremely well. Most of them have grown big and bushy, and we’ve had enough to make a big green bean and potato salad, with another big batch in the fridge.
12. Yellow summer squash – this seemed to suffer after I planted it, but now it’s picked up and doing pretty well. I expect it to start producing any day now.
13. Carrots – Doing well, but they’re also sort of “unwrapping” the outside layer from the core. They’re still edible, but they look awfully funny. I didn’t do the best job of thinning them, so I’m not sure if that’s part of it or not. They do seem to be too close together.
14. Eggplant – The four original ones I planted are getting big and starting to flower. I think we’ll have some eggplant when we get back from Italy, if not before. The last one, which I just planted within the last month, had a hard time after transplanting, but seems to finally be perking up. Whew.
15. Parsley – Growing quickly into bushes. Hopefully I didn’t plant too much! We’ll be making a lot of bagnet this year, I hope.
16. Leeks – are flowering. Not good. They’re forming a woody center stalk, which makes them difficult if not impossible to eat. I have to get them out of the ground to salvage what I can. They do have beautiful flowers at least. They never got big like the ones you buy at the store. Loris says it’s because they’re too close together. Honestly, I’m not sure they’re worth the trouble. I can see lining the border of a bed with them, but dedicating a whole space to them is probably not the way to go. We just don’t need that many.
Friday, June 6, 2008
Summer garden shaping up
The weather is officially warming up, and the garden is slowly transforming from spring into summer. It's amazing how quickly everything takes off as soon as the warm weather arrives.
Here's a brief diagram of what things look like right now:
The tomatoes are growing like crazy, and I can't always catch the suckers before they get too big. Luckily, I've still got things mostly under control, and I've starting tying up the vines to their stakes. I'll write more about the tomatoes soon. Suffice to say we've got quite a few green ones.
The zucchini is also growing amazingly quickly. We have one small green one, which will probably be ready today or tomorrow. Now THAT was fast!
The green beans already have tiny, little fruits, I'm really looking forward to eating my first green beans of the season. I have at least two or three varieties planted. Green beans seem to go through a shock when they're transplanted. They always seem to wither a bit and take a few days to recover. The most recent transplants are still suffering, but the older plants are quickly turning into bushes.
The carrots are coming up just beautifully. (Reminder to self - post a picture!) Despite my thinning, they are still to close together, but I'm trying to pick the bigger ones in each group and leave some space for the smaller ones to grow some more.
The eggplants aren't doing much. I'm hoping they wake up soon, and realize that summer is almost here!
I may have planted the beets a little late, I was just trying to get something into the ground in a small patch I have available. I'm actually having weed issues in that corner of the garden. The peas are drying out, and almost not producing at all anymore, so they're coming out soon, possibly this weekend. After I harvest the beets (and carrots), I may do a serious weeding session and try to conquer them. The real issue is my garden neighbor, who lets his lot go pretty badly in the winter. The weeds just keep spreading over to my side from there.
The garlic and shallots are drying out! I turned off their sprinklers a couple weeks ago, and they're starting to turn brown. Good timing, since our garlic from last year is going bad pretty quickly. Lukcily we only have a couple heads left. I'm really looking forward to braiding the garlic this year, and also to trying our first home-grown shallots!
Everything else is doing really well. The basil plants are quickly becoming bushes, the cucumber is starting to climb it's cage, the ambrosia melon is spreading in all directions, and the leeks are ... still there. They don't seem to be getting much bigger, but they're just as delicious at the size they are now.
And that's everything! I guess my updates aren't ever really that quick!
Sunday, April 27, 2008
Warm-weather plantings
Today I finally planted our warm-weather veggies. It's supposed to cool off a bit this week, but I'm not too worried at this point. I'm so excited to get my first glimpse of what my summer garden will look like.
Yesterday we drove out to Granite Bay for a wedding. I've had no luck in Davis finding 6-packs of the vegetables I want to plant - I guess most people don't garden at that kind of volume. So we stopped at this wonderful nursery in Granite Bay and found an amazing variety of heirloom tomatoes, peppers, and melons, as well as plenty of more standard varieties in 6-packs. I bought 24 roma tomatoes for sauce, and 5 heirlooms - Watermelon beefsteak, cherokee purple, black krim, black prince, and yellow brandywine. We also got 12 yellow bell pepper plants, 6 more green beans to replace the ones that don't look so good after the cold nights we had last week, one hot chili pepper for Loris, and two ambrosia melons. I bought 12 red pepper plants today, too.
Today was a big day, Loris helped me put the tomato stakes into the garden, and I planted all 30 tomato plants, plus all the peppers, melons, green beans, and two eggplants - black beauty and bianca rosa. I also finally got the watering system up and running without too much effort on my part. And what a hot day it was! But luckily, I've really done the majority of the work required to get the summer garden in. Now it's just a lot of maintenance - weeding, watering, and pruning the tomatoes. Until it's time for the garlic to come out, and then I can consider what to put there - another zucchini? Or a winter squash?
A few days ago I planted some more carrots and beets, even though I think it may be too warm for them now. I guess we'll see. I also put in some pickling cucumbers and Italian parsley. And in the backyard, I planted some yellow wax pole beans. I've never grown those before, and I have no idea how it'll work out. It's sort of an experiment.
And finally - we're starting to have peas! I've never grown peas or even eaten fresh peas as far as I know, so I'm a bit nervous and have no idea what I'm doing. I'm sure we won't have enough for them to be a main dish, but I'm excited that at least I'll learn for next year. Even though they're a bush variety and not vining plants, they're putting out little tendrils and trying to attach themselves to other nearby plants. I put one tomato cage on its side between two of the rows, and used a small trellis for the other ones. I tied some of the unruly plants up with string to keep them from clinging to the peppers.
Yesterday we drove out to Granite Bay for a wedding. I've had no luck in Davis finding 6-packs of the vegetables I want to plant - I guess most people don't garden at that kind of volume. So we stopped at this wonderful nursery in Granite Bay and found an amazing variety of heirloom tomatoes, peppers, and melons, as well as plenty of more standard varieties in 6-packs. I bought 24 roma tomatoes for sauce, and 5 heirlooms - Watermelon beefsteak, cherokee purple, black krim, black prince, and yellow brandywine. We also got 12 yellow bell pepper plants, 6 more green beans to replace the ones that don't look so good after the cold nights we had last week, one hot chili pepper for Loris, and two ambrosia melons. I bought 12 red pepper plants today, too.
Today was a big day, Loris helped me put the tomato stakes into the garden, and I planted all 30 tomato plants, plus all the peppers, melons, green beans, and two eggplants - black beauty and bianca rosa. I also finally got the watering system up and running without too much effort on my part. And what a hot day it was! But luckily, I've really done the majority of the work required to get the summer garden in. Now it's just a lot of maintenance - weeding, watering, and pruning the tomatoes. Until it's time for the garlic to come out, and then I can consider what to put there - another zucchini? Or a winter squash?
A few days ago I planted some more carrots and beets, even though I think it may be too warm for them now. I guess we'll see. I also put in some pickling cucumbers and Italian parsley. And in the backyard, I planted some yellow wax pole beans. I've never grown those before, and I have no idea how it'll work out. It's sort of an experiment.
And finally - we're starting to have peas! I've never grown peas or even eaten fresh peas as far as I know, so I'm a bit nervous and have no idea what I'm doing. I'm sure we won't have enough for them to be a main dish, but I'm excited that at least I'll learn for next year. Even though they're a bush variety and not vining plants, they're putting out little tendrils and trying to attach themselves to other nearby plants. I put one tomato cage on its side between two of the rows, and used a small trellis for the other ones. I tied some of the unruly plants up with string to keep them from clinging to the peppers.
Wednesday, August 1, 2007
Another busy day
We had our first slices of ambrosia melon last night. They were so good! I was worried because although the melon "slipped" off the vine, it didn't seem ripe and I thought maybe I had just been pulling too hard. But after a day or two on the counter, it got softer and developed a wonderful ripe smell. Whew.
I'm not too happy with the new mixer so far. I tried to make a really wet dough this morning, and it seems like the dough hook only mixed the top 1/4 of the dough. Underneath, the flour wasn't incorporating at all. I don't know if the bowl is too big for the recipe, the calibration of the machine is off so the hook doesn't go down far enough, or what. I had to scrape down the sides to the point that I was more or less mixing the dough by hand, then I switched to the paddle attachment just to get the dough mixed (since the dough was so wet that it was somewhat batter-like), then switched back to the hook to knead, although it still seemed like it was only moving around the top of the mixture, so I don't know how effective the kneading was. Really disappointing. I'll have to try some stiffer doughs before I see if there's really something wrong.
The ketchup yesterday turned out delish, btw! Thank goodness for that! And it cooked down in only 3-4 hours (which helps since it took so long to get rid of the peels and seeds).
For the rest of the day, I made tomato sauce and giardiniera. And that took forever. I got thirteen jars of tomato sauce (fourteen originally, but one broke while I was sterilizing it), and so far 4 large jars of giardiniera. I ran out of pint jars. And then I ran out of time. I was sweating so badly in the kitchen with the hot giardiniera, the boiling water from the canning bath, the oven from baking bread, and the heat outside. Whew! Doing all this stuff is hot sweaty work!
I'm not too happy with the new mixer so far. I tried to make a really wet dough this morning, and it seems like the dough hook only mixed the top 1/4 of the dough. Underneath, the flour wasn't incorporating at all. I don't know if the bowl is too big for the recipe, the calibration of the machine is off so the hook doesn't go down far enough, or what. I had to scrape down the sides to the point that I was more or less mixing the dough by hand, then I switched to the paddle attachment just to get the dough mixed (since the dough was so wet that it was somewhat batter-like), then switched back to the hook to knead, although it still seemed like it was only moving around the top of the mixture, so I don't know how effective the kneading was. Really disappointing. I'll have to try some stiffer doughs before I see if there's really something wrong.
The ketchup yesterday turned out delish, btw! Thank goodness for that! And it cooked down in only 3-4 hours (which helps since it took so long to get rid of the peels and seeds).
For the rest of the day, I made tomato sauce and giardiniera. And that took forever. I got thirteen jars of tomato sauce (fourteen originally, but one broke while I was sterilizing it), and so far 4 large jars of giardiniera. I ran out of pint jars. And then I ran out of time. I was sweating so badly in the kitchen with the hot giardiniera, the boiling water from the canning bath, the oven from baking bread, and the heat outside. Whew! Doing all this stuff is hot sweaty work!
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