Full Circle: July 2011

ANOTHER New Bed

I'm crazy, and obsessive. This year's garden has an additional 4' x 8' foot bed that I made.

January 23, 2011 - New Bed!

So the total is:

Four 4' x 4' beds
Two 4' x 8' beds
Two 3' x 5' beds
+ containers
= OBSESSION

I could barely wait to get my seeds started, and in fact started them way too early, which led to horrible, horrible things in spring.

My typical last frost is in early-mid February, so counting on this I started almost all of the seeds (lavender, hot peppers, bell peppers, basil and thai basil) in January. Stupid.

I bought a little greenhouse, and new seed starting trays with bigger cells, things SHOULD have been perfect. Except, So Cal decided to become Seattle for 4 months and rain constantly, never have any sun, and be freezing all the time.

All of these seedlings died because it never got warm enough to transplant and they had become root-bound and malnourished.

January 23, 2011 - Live and learn

Software?

My mother gave me a random issue of Mother Earth News, I casually glanced at it, and saw an ad for their Vegetable Garden Management Software. Intrigued, I went to their website, downloaded the free 30-day trial, and 6 months later I can't imagine how I ever lived without it.

Here is a screenshot of my 2011 Garden.

The Winter Garden...or as close to it as sea level elevation in the Southern California Desert gets

I love Southern California. I can't think of an easier and more accommodating place to start a garden besides Hawaii. Seasons are relative, and there are many crops I can grow year round with little to no season extending techniques. Case in point: my tomatoes ripened in one big crop in December, at the end of the month, while I was in Israel. I didn't get to eat any of them, but I did feel pretty bad ass to be growing edible tomatoes in December with no crop cover or green house involved. I planted garlic at the end of November, and covered it with about an inch of mulch to protect it over the cold, cold "winter". It started sprouting in December since it was insanely warm. It wasn't supposed to do anything until March or later.

December 11, 2011 - Stupid garlic thinks it's spring

December 11, 2010 - Basil isn't looking so happy

December 11, 2010 - The bell peppers are done, but here comes the kale!

December 11, 2010 - The first of MANY MANY December tomatoes

Making Popcorn...sort of

The popcorn had finished drying in the garage, so it was time to de-kernel it and pop it! While the popcorn was very pretty, it didn't really pop well. About 30% of the kernels popped, the rest just burned and stunk up the kitchen. I most likely let it get too dry. It pops best when it has 13.5% - 14% moisture, but I'm still not really sure how I would go about checking that.

October 19, 2010 - Pretty yes, edible...meh.

October: The Month of Sad Fruit

I finally started getting edible tomatoes in OCTOBER. I planted late, it's totally my fault. I also noticed that my newly vibrant watermelon, was unfortunately on it's way out for good. So I picked the one watermelon that had grown larger than a marble, and pulled out the plant.

October 16, 2010 - Pathetic tomatoes and an even more pathetic watermelon

Hope for Watermelon

I mentioned in a previous blog that my watermelons were nearly wiped out by aphids while I was out of the country, I resuscitated them and watched them vigilantly, and lo and behold in September I had melons!

September 18, 2010 - Zombie Watermelon!

POPCORN!

It was finally time to harvest the popcorn I had planted in early spring. I grew up on a small farm and all we ever grew was sweet corn, which I'm not a huge fan of (I know, I know, I'm a horrible person). I really like popcorn, so I figured, why not grow what I like?

September 15, 2010 - Look closely, each kernel has a swirly pattern.

September 15, 2010 - Pollination issues yes, but still pretty nonetheless.

September 15, 2010 - The cat was very much involved with the popcorn harvesting.

September 15, 2010 - Look closely at the two purple kernels at the top.

A Pretty Sunflower

My sister got me a $25 Home Depot gift card for my birthday, it came with a tiny packet of sunflower seeds glued to it. I planted them and they ended up being really pretty.

August 29, 2010 - About to open

The REAL Harvesting Starts

Once July and August came around things really got rolling. I had more chard then I knew what to do with, and I'm pretty sure my family and friends are still sick of it since at every gathering I brought several "bouquets" of it with me, along with TONS of basil and sage. So lesson learned, an entire bed of chard for one person is WAY too much, and four basil plants is just plain silly unless you own an Italian restaurant. I made pesto almost weekly - until January.

August 21, 2010 - Typical Bi-Weekly Harvest

August 29, 2010 - Basil, chives, cilantro, rosemary, sage.

August 29, 2010 - The Garden in full swing

My friend Mark gave me some bell pepper transplants from the school he works at, and those started fruiting as well, I usually got 1-2 a week.

August 29, 2010 - Free bell peppers from The Farm!

I also harvested lots of carrots, pretty sure my vision will be fine for years to come.

July 23, 2010 - Carrots! And a curious cat in the background.

The cat liked to help once I got the veggies inside:

July 23, 2010 - Mao loves lettuce, or possibly just getting in the way.

My watermelon also came back from the dead (it had been infested with aphids while I was gone) with a lot of work on my part spraying a water/ivory mixture on the leaves.

August 29, 2010 - Very sad looking watermelon leaf.

Back from Vacation

I went to England and Ireland for almost three weeks. The first half of the trip my then boyfriend took care of the garden (and killed the strawberries) and the second half of the trip my friend Mark came over every day from Redlands to water the garden. When I returned home, it was like stepping into the twilight zone. Instead of my nightmares of a parched, dead garden, I saw a fully mature garden, just begging to have things harvested from it. Each plant had tripled in size, and most of them were ready to eat!

Here's the contrast: