The Perfect Scarecrow

I’ve seen lots of scarecrows in my gardening life, and sometimes I think the scarecrows are more for us humans than they are to actually scare crows away.  The coolest scarecrow I’ve seen was named Esmerelda and she had a really neat hand painted gourd head, mardi-gras beads, boobs, cool dress, and I don’t know if she scared any crows away but she was way cool.  She lived in a blueberry patch.

 I’ve just planted the first planting of sweet corn, and as soon as those kernels sprout and head skyward the crows start plucking.  Today I was working in the tomato patch (installing drip tape, yet another blog story) and I heard the crows squawking.  I know the corn hasn’t come up yet, but that was my signal to install the scarecrows.

When I first started growing corn here, it was the first time I had actually grown corn (about 3 years ago).  I never really had enough land to grow corn, since it takes quite a bit of space to do well. 

When the corn started sprouting that first year, my neighbor told me he had seen crows eating the sprouts.  I panicked, and immediately thought “oh my gosh, I don’t have clothes for a scarecrow, or a hat, and what kind of head do I put on it?” (lol)  He told me the best scarecrow was to simply tie a black garbage bag on a pole and stick it in the ground in the corn patch.  The crows think it’s a dead crow on a stick so they don’t come near.

I’ve got these neat plastic fence posts that I’ve used for everything from flower bed surrounds, chicken lots, dog lots, flower bed protection to tomato supports…..blah, blah, but every spring, several of them don garbage bags and keep the crows away until the corn gets too big for the crows to be interested in messing with it.  Trust me, it works here!   I put them about 30′ on center around the corn patch.  Cheap and reliable.

Home grown veggies and water hoses

Happy Mother’s Day!  I went to visit my mom and dad, sisters, brother in laws, nephews, etc., today and we had a wonderful picnic on an absolutely gorgeous spring day. 

There is a bumper crop of bibb lettuce at the farm this year, so I picked a bag for each sister and my parents.  I don’t listen to the news, don’t have tv, so when I handed them the lettuce and they laughed and jokingly said “does it have e-coli on it”, I said “of course not, I grew it and I know how it was grown and picked”.   Then they told me about the e-coli recall from several major grocery stores involving fresh green veggies. 

It’s getting to be a scary place out there, depending on folks we don’t know to provide our food.  I don’t grow everything I eat, but if I could, I would.

Yesterday I planted the tomato plants; around 320 of them, assorted heirloom varieties, and several “mainstream” varieties that produce well, taste good, or have good qualities to them.  The garden prep went well, manure spreading, post installation, wire stringing, planting…..then came the watering in of the plants.  I think the initial watering in of a freshly planted plant is as important as colostrum is to a human or animal when it’s first born.

Anyway, the garden I planted the tomatoes in is in an area where there is irrigation pipe to the general area for drip tape, but to do the first watering I have to drag water hoses around. 

I don’t think there’s anyone around who hates water hoses as badly as I do.  I bought 2 that are supposed to be “kink free” but they still kink, although it’s easier to get the kink out than a regular water hose.  I had them hooked together and couldn’t quite reach the last 1/4 of the beds (you know the story).

A few years ago my son (college, okay) gave me a waterhose during one of his moves.  He said he didn’t need it anymore.  It looked like a college kid water hose (cheap), but I took it anyway, being the great mom that I am 🙂

I haven’t used the hose much but I do remember looking at it oddly as it doesn’t hang in nice round loops, but rather in a strange accordian fashion. 

Back to the tomatoes.  I needed just a little bit more water hose to get to the end of the beds I had planted so I got the college kid water hose out.  Oh my gosh—-it is the water hose from hell…..kink is not the word.  AFTER I had convinced it to straighten out straight (about 15 minutes of messing with it),  I had to hold it gently in my arms to keep it from kinking just from holding the nozzle at the end to spray the plants.  It was worse than worst!  I honestly think I could have carried water in 5-gallon buckets faster than I got that hose to work, but it became a challenge, know what I mean? 

It did not get thrown away though.  I’m somewhat of a packrat of things that might be useful in another life.  I left it laying in the garden, so I know where it is, and it will serve another useful purpose, but I promise it will never have water running through it again!

The hands of a gardener

Did you ever stop to think about how much of our food never touches a human hand?  To me, that’s scary.  I have three beautiful Red Star chickens and each day they lay three beautiful brown eggs.  I enjoy those eggs, as do my closest friends.  My best friend said she had to buy eggs from the store last week and her husband made the comment to her one day that “those weren’t Terry’s eggs” and she asked how he could tell.  He said that they didn’t have the flavor, the texture, or the color of the farm fresh eggs from my chickens.  That was a compliment!

While working in the garden today and moving the chickens around, it dawned on me that so much of our food is never touched by humans.  I have “gardening” friends that load seed into a machine, plant it in the soil, spray the veggies with a sprayer on a tractor, then use a “picker” to harvest the vegetables.  The only time the vegetable is touched seems like when it hits the kitchen sink to be washed and prepared.  That’s sad.

I know there are a lot of people to feed in the world, and everyone can’t belong to a CSA or even know where their food comes from, but being in the business really opens you up to just how much junk there is out there that can be done to our food that no one really realizes. 

It’s so easy to get caught up in the “spray” for everything that I think today’s farmers have just gotten lazy.  Sure, it takes more time and energy to spread manure over a bed rather than sprinkle some fertilizer on, but the manure is feeding the soil and not just the plant. 

It might take a little more time to soak a bag of manure in water to form “manure tea” to water with, but the solution has a lot more microorganisms in it than a solution of chemical fertilizer. 

As far as insect control, building and hanging birdhouses, attracting birds to the garden areas, taking care of toads, bats, and dragonflies might seem frivolous to some, but those are all important aspects of gardening with nature.  Sure, a sprinkle with poison would get rid of the bugs quicker, but what about the critters that eat those bugs?  We don’t want rid of them too. 

Every time I see a toad in the garden, a dragonfly cruising overhead, the bluebirds in all the boxes I’ve built them, the salamanders, snakes, and wood ducks who all call this place home, how can I poison anything?  It’s all connected.  Too many gardeners are worried about the perfect plant.  A few bug holes don’t hurt anything….hand picking works well, but healthy soil and healthy plants work best.  I think keeping poison out of the food chain is a great start to a happy ending!  It’s still a lot of hard work, though 🙂

Rockin’ Right Along!

Things are rocking right along on the farm, ahead of schedule according to my notes!  No time to celebrate though, Mother (Nature, that is) could change everything in a second!  It takes a lot of courage and discipline to be a farmer for a living.  I think diversification is the key to success though. 

Today is REALLY WINDY!  I mean, like really windy…..I have “fixed” the so-called “floating” row covers twice already, and they keep floating….

 

I decided to wait until tomorrow to “fix” them again, after the wind calms down.  The covers aren’t really for anything more than heating up the space around the seeds to speed things up a little at this point in time.  In these beds are planted peas, carrots, beets, spinach, lettuce, swiss chard, kale, arugula, and radishes.  Some of them are germinating; others are still asleep.  The pile of garbage bags in the picture is not garbage, it’s leaves for mulching!  These black bags have found their way all over the farm, both placed on purpose, and collected from fence wire, tree trunks, in the pond.  I’m learning how to control them better though.  A local community brought a portion of their leaves to the farm to both save them time and help me out–win-win!

In the greenhouse there are flats of broccoli, cabbage, various lettuces, swiss chard, more arugula, kohlrabi, chinese cabbage, chives, onions, about 15 varieties of tomatoes, artichokes, about 8 varieties of peppers, and I’m sure I forgot somebody.  Speaking of peppers, I just got seeds for a variety of sweet pepper called “Sweet Diablo”.  It is a longhorn-type pepper that gets up to 10″ long and 2″ wide and turns red when fully mature.  They are supposed to be great for stuffing.  I’m excited about these….also the “Fooled You” jalapeno pepper that’s not hot.  This year I was fortunate enough to get seeds for 11 different heirloom tomatoes that I’m anxious to share with the members. 

A new garden area was plowed recently and tilled yesterday.  When you’re growing veggies on a schedule you have to push the limits sometimes.  Parts of the garden were a still a little wet (clayey streaks in the soil) but most of it tilled up very nicely.  Now to spread manure and till again.  This will be the home for most of the tomato plants. 

The corn/potato/sweet potato/winter squash field was plowed yesterday.  This field is on a gentle southward slope so it dries quicker than the other gardens on the farm.  This field can rest for a few weeks before time to “dig in” there.

When do CSA farmers plant?  Well, I would say every day–it takes every day planting to have a continuous harvest all season.  This time of year I watch the propagation mats with an eagle eye—every time a flat germinates it goes off into the greenhouse and another flat of “I need heat to germinate” seeds goes on.  Then I watch the flats to catch them as soon as they are ready to separate into cell packs and move into the cold frame set up outside the greenhouse.  One cold frame is filled up; another one will be set up tomorrow. 

Today is also rainy.  I made a batch of peppermint/oatmeal soap, tie-dyed a few shirts, fed all the critters, potted up two flats of tomatoes and sowed more lettuce, herbs, and a few flower seeds in the greenhouse.  Gotta keep “rockin on” no matter the weather!

Get to know your veggies–Broccoli

Remember when we were kids how disgusting broccoli was?  The only broccoli I remember being offered was the frozen stuff which I suppose remotely resembled broccoli.  The ONLY thing that made it palatable was the melted Velveeta on top.  I don’t even remember anyone growing broccoli when I was a kid, come to think of it.

Broccoli is a member of the brassica family, along with cabbage, kohlrabi, brussels sprouts, and cauliflower, to name a few.  Broccoli is a little tricky to grow, I must say.  It needs to be timed so it matures in cool weather, meaning spring or fall.  I’ve had more success with it in the fall (except last year, the broccoli didn’t learn how to swim so it drowned a slow, terrible, slimy death (oops, sorry–I keep obsessing about all the rain last year)….back to the present.  The best broccoli I ever grew was in the spring, in a brand new garden bed that only gets about 6 hours of sun a day (the farm is at the foot of a mountain).  The plants were huge and the heads were awesome as well.

Broccoli is prone to those cabbage moth worms, but to take care of them, I spray Bt on the plants every few days and that usually takes care of the problem.  I’ve tried floating row covers, but somehow those moths always manage to get in there and lay their eggs so not only do I not know the moths are flying about right away, I’m usually greeted by a crowd of worms upon removing the cover from the crop.  Also, I think the row cover tends to make the plants too warm, making them tend to bolt quicker.  This year I’ve purchased diatomaceous earth which is supposed to kill these cabbage worms by slicing their skin and causing them to deydrate—I can’t wait to see that!  (we gardeners get sadistic sometimes, you know…..)

Broccoli is one of the most nutritious veggies we can eat.  Broccoli is high in vitamins C, K, and A, as well as fiber.  It also contains several anti-cancer compounds, and a half-cup provides 52 mg of Vitamin C.  The benefits of broccoli are greatly reduced if the vegetable is boiled more than ten minutes, so a slight nuke in the microwave or just eating it raw would be better than cooking it very much.  Studies have also shown that eating A LOT of broccoli slows down agressive prostate cancer (I’m not sure how much A LOT is) and broccoli is good for your heart.

Broccoli is great raw in a salad, or on a crudite plate with cauliflower (one of its cousins), carrots, celery, and kohlrabi—-oh yes, and a big bowl of ranch dressing right in the middle for dipping!  It’s also great in stir fries or lightly steamed with butter and salt, or cheese sauce. 

Recipes…..ah, recipes.  This broccoli salad is totally EXCEPTIONAL!  It simply won’t last in the fridge (with me around, anyway).   It’s from my favorite recipe site, Allrecipes.com, and here’s the link to Bodacious Broccoli Salad.  I hope you enjoy it as much as I do!   I used a colby/jack mixed cheese because that’s what I had in the fridge.  http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Bodacious-Broccoli-Salad/Detail.aspx

How to prevent “damping off”

Anyone who has ever started seedlings in the house or in a greenhouse has looked in on their seedlings at one time or another and found them laying face down on the soil.  The stem is wilted at the soil line.  This condition is called “damping off” and is caused by a fungus.

Several years ago I learned a trick to thwart the damping off fungus:  After you get your seeds sown in the flat (of new potting mix), sprinkle a thin layer of milled peat moss over the entire surface of the flat.  Also, water them from the bottom by soaking the flat in a larger container of water, rather than sprinkling from the top. 

I keep an oscillating fan in the greenhouse also, which keeps air circulating when it gets really humid and “stuffy” in there.

Knock on wood, no one’s been laying face down in the dirt since I’ve done this.  With all the seed starting going on right now, I thought someone might benefit from this trick!

Happy seeding from Wild Things 🙂

Variety is the spice of life–and the garden!

Farmers select various varieties of crops for different reasons.  Some varieties are disease resistant, some taste better, some varieties are selected for their growth habits (for example bush beans vs. pole beans), hand-me-down seeds (aka heirlooms) and some are just prettier. 

In conversations with folks about vegetables and gardening, the question always comes up:  “What kind of so-and-so do you grow?”   I like to learn about what works for other farmers, so in turn, I will share what works here at the farm as far as varieties go.  Some of the reasons certain varieties are selected can’t be easily explained (pretty picture, nice description in the catalog, someone recommended it, I was hungry when I was looking at the seed catalog…..), but I grow them again because they worked.   

We’ll try to take this in alphabetical order to keep it organized just a little bit, and I’m not covering every single crop that’s grown either.

• Artichoke, Imperial Star–This is an experiment this year, so I can’t really comment on how tasty they are, how they grow, or pest resistance.  I’m growing this variety because the seed catalog said it could be grown from seed in one season in this area (Cumberland Plateau, Tennessee).  We’ll see.
• Basil, Lemon and Large Leaf Sweet–I grow these two because I bought a seed mix for the last two years and it seemed like most of the seeds were those teeny tiny little leaves that didn’t look like basil, and a big bunch of them were licorice basil too, which not many people like.  The lemon basil and sweet basil seemed to be the most popular, so that’s what I’m sticking with.
• Green Beans—Ah, green beans; a favorite of southern gardeners.  I grow several varieties of these.  I grow Case Knife beans which is an heirloom, about 10″ long and 1/2-3/4″ wide (about the size of a table knife).  This is the only pole bean grown on the farm simply due to the amount of labor it takes to erect the structures for them to climb on—these are worth the effort though.  Roma II are grown because they are tasty and stringless (wide flat bean) and this year Top Crop, Burpee Stringless Bush, and Peanut Garden Beans are being grown because of their growth habit (bush), stringless, and I’ve read that they are tasty–we’ll see.
• Broccoli–Southern Comet is the choice here because it tolerates heat without bolting too quickly.  I don’t care how careful one is to plant broccoli early so it will mature “before the heat of the summer” or late so it will “be kissed by the first frosts” it’s going to be exposed to SUMMER around here.  This variety is recommended for southern gardeners and I believe it would have worked out well last year if it hadn’t been so wet; there were a few heads that matured despite being grown in a rice patty situation.
• Cabbage–The cabbage choice at Wild Things is “Cabbage Babies”.  Many members didn’t know what to do with an entire head of cabbage since not many folks make kraut any more, so after researching, I found Cabbage Babies.  It’s a wonderful variety of savoy, green, and purple cabbage all in one packet.  Each head is a little bigger than a softball, and just enough for a meal.
• Carrots–Little Finger are the faves because they mature quicker, they are sweet, and don’t get woody.
• Cucumbers–There’s a variety called “Diva” that has all female flowers and doesn’t require a male for pollination.  The cukes don’t have prickly spines on them and they are very crispy.  Bush type cukes are great too, and Bush Crop and Spacemaster Bush taste well and don’t sprawl everywhere, but a vine-type called Straight 8 is grown just because it’s a reliable producer of tasty cucumbers.
• Eggplant—Black Beauty is a reliable producer, Ichiban has non-bitter oriental-type fruits, and Cloud Nine looks cool (well, it does).
• Lettuce—My absolute fave is the Lettuce Mix from Pinetree Seeds.  It has the most beautiful mix of lettuces I’ve seen, it’s not bothered by insects, and it’s a reliable producer if you’re careful how you harvest it to not damage the plant.  It doesn’t keep well from season-to-season though, so don’t order more than you’ll use in one season.  Bibb Summer head lettuce is also planted for the members who like a “loose leaf” head lettuce.
• I grow several onions, but one I’ve fallen in love with is a scallion-type onion, called Purplette.  I like it because it’s pretty in salads and it’s a great tasting green onion.
• Parsley–The flat Italian type is the only kind to grow for cooking.  The pretty, fluffy, curled parsley that sits on a plate is only good for that; sitting on a plate and looking pretty.
• Pepper—Oh man, I’m growing 13 varieties of peppers this year (so far).  I LOVE peppers—they can make a dish go from mmmmm, to AHHHHHHH or oooooooh real quick!  Most of the members don’t like hot peppers but I do.  I grow a few jalapenos and hot bananas for my kitchen and the members who like them, but there are so many great sweet peppers out nowadays that I had to try several of them; Big Bertha, Gourmet Sweet, Chinese Giant, Planet Hybrid, Sheepnose Pimento, Banana Bill, Aruba Cubanelle, and I can’t tell you one thing about them yet—–later!
• Radishes—French Breakfast because they are pretty and tasty too, and Cherry Belle cause they are the “proverbial” radish and they perform well.
• Spinach —Bloomsdale Longstanding, which is not really spinach at all, but spinach bolts really quickly around here, and this is a universally grown substitute that a lot of people don’t know really isn’t spinach, so shhhhhh, don’t say anything!
• Squash—Summer varieties include Yellow Crookneck (taste), Celestial Scallop (pretty, and tastes good too), Black Beauty Zucchini (taste, good performer) and Spaghetti Squash because it tastes really good, is unusual, and is a reliable performer; winter varieties include Butternut (good performer, taste), Ebony Acorn is reliable and tastes good, and some new varieties this year are being tried because of the awesome job the writers did in the seed catalogs.  These include Bush Delicata and Cream of the Crop Winter Hybrid.
• Tomatoes could take up an entire web page as far as I’m concerned, but I grow Better Boy because they taste and look good, Mr. Stripey for the taste, and Cherokee Purple (heirloom) for the taste.  I also like Roma for paste tomatoes, and Early Girl because, well, they’re early!  This year I’m growing seedlings of 11 varieties of heirloom tomatoes for a friend of mine and he said I could have some of the plants—the names of them aren’t anything you’ll see in a catalog but I can’t wait to try them!   Lemon Boy is on the list this year too just because the yellow tomatoes have less acid and some folks can’t tolerate the acid found in red tomatoes.
• Purple Top Turnips are what you grow around here if you grow turnips.  They are reliable and they taste yummy raw or fried (I can’t stand them boiled, sorry!)
• Watermelon–These fruits aren’t very reliable here on the mountain, but I grow Sugar Baby because they are small, mature quicker, and they are sweet just like their name says.

Well, that’s about it for the variety column.  We’ll do a review of them at the end of the season.  Happy planting, everyone!

The Quest for the Homegrown Artichoke (part II)

We have germination!  It’s been 8 days since the artichoke seeds hit the dirt and yesterday there were slight hints of green and today, voila!  We have fresh-born artichokes–well, that may be stretching it a little far. 

I’m currently reading “The Four-Season Harvest” by Eliot Coleman and he has artichokes in his appendix with instructions included.  His comments were that we needed to fool the artichokes into believing that they’ve been in the garden for 2 seasons since they are biennial, so the first 6-8 weeks they need to be kept warm (their first summer) and then a cool spell, then real summer.  I have ideas on how that can happen, now if I can get Mother to cooperate…….

Gentlemen (and women), start your tillers!

The first of 6 beds freshly tilled; twigs from sycamore cleaned up and turning to ash

NASCAR got started last month, and this month in my area of Tennessee, we farmers get started!  Yesterday was the day that the soil in the “Front Bluff Garden” was dry enough to make a ball in your fist, but fall apart when you poke it gently.  Woohoo! 

There are 6 separate garden areas on the farm, and they all have names just so I can keep records of what grew where for rotation, and also to keep records on what did well in certain beds and all that other garden stuff (bugs, weeds, etc.)

The Front Bluff Garden is the closest to the house and it’s my favorite garden to work in.  I’m not sure if it’s because there’s a cool bluff on the back side of it, or that my herb garden sits atop a small bluff on the front side of it, or that a giant sycamore tree flanks the north end of it where I can rest in the shade and listen to all sorts of birds during  days in that garden.  This garden grows awesome lettuce and spinach, and crops such as tomatoes, garlic, peppers and green beans have been rotated in and out. 

This year, plans are to plant carrots, beets, and peas today; there are flats of spinach and lettuce in the greenhouse just waiting to be placed in the ground.  For now, I must go to the manure pile, spread manure, top with composted leaves, then till once more before the seeds “hit the dirt”.  It’s kind of like following a recipe in the kitchen….only much more fun.

The Quest for the Homegrown Artichoke

Each year I add new veggies to the crop cornucopia here on the farm, and one of the newbies this season is artichokes.  I remember the first time I ever ate an artichoke–that was an experience!  First off, it looked like a monster-size of something I surely would have pulled out of the garden weeks before…….

Okay, boil it for 20 minutes and then what?  Pull the leaves off and scrape the end of it with your teeth?  Hmmmmm, tastes great, but not filling.  With the leaves all gone, my next question was “is that all?”  Oh no, now you pull it apart, BE SURE to scrape all the nasty-tasting hairs out, then savor the heart of this member of the thistle family…..ooooh, savor I did!

Never thought they would grow in Tennessee, but while perusing the mountains of seed catalogs I receive each year, I came across a variety that is bred to be grown as an annual.  In the warmer areas of the country where artichokes are grown commercially, they are grown as perennials or biennials, but they won’t withstand our temperatures around here. 

Anyway, in the Johnny’s Selected Seeds catalog I saw “Imperial Star” artichoke seeds.  The info on the packet is that they will mature in 85 days and the narrative in the catalog suggests that they can be grown in most any part of the country, with a little extra care. 

Yesterday a spot on the propagation mat came open so I sowed 2 packets of seed into 1 flat.  Each packet contains “a minimum of 50 seeds”, and actually there were 57 seeds in each pack 🙂  The seeds look like shelled sunflower seeds, and the whole time I was meticulously placing the seeds in the neat little rows in the flat I was thinking to myself that I bet mice sure would love to eat these seeds…….

The next morning, sure enough, there were a few telltale holes in the soil mix, but they didn’t get too many—glad there were 57 seeds in each pack!

Yet another use for duct tape:

I took a flat with smaller holes in the bottom of it, flipped it upside down over the flat of vulnerable artichoke seeds, duct-taped it securely, and voila!  Mouse-proof seedling tray.

The saga goes on though…..seed packet instructs that artichoke seeds germinate best under alternating temperatures; huh?  8 hours at 80-85 degrees, then 16 hours at 68-75 degrees.  Okay, I’m doing my best, but I’m beginning to understand why they cost $2.00 each at the store.

As soon as anything exciting happens, the next article in the series will appear on the blog……meanwhile, I think it’s time to go adjust the thermostat on the propagation mat (jk)!