First Harvest on Peas

I love crowder peas! We planted Pinkeyes last year, and they're good. They're easy to pick because they tell you when they're ready (their hulls turn purple), and they taste a bit like black eyes.

But crowder peas... they're delicious! They turn a dark red when cooked, and they produce a dark burgundy to brown pot liquor that's to die for.

 

So we brought in several hand fulls of peas. Some weren't all the way "ready" but with crowders it's harder to tell. The smart thing to do is probably to blanch and freeze them and wait til another mess comes off the vines. But what I want to do? I want to eat 'em. 

We're gonna have peas and cornbread, and I guarantee you, it will be delicious! 

 

 Dad's got deer meat in the freezer, add some squash and zucchini from the garden, along with crowder peas and fresh cornbread, some sauteed sweet potato in browned butter, and some rice with au gus gravy... So excited! 

Pests and Problems

Work work work.

I had begun noticing strangely bare branches poking up all over my tomato plants earlier this week. It looked like something had gotten into the yard and was helping themselves to the leaves!






















I really had no idea what was going on until... I saw this guy.  
I pulled 14 of them out of my tomatoes. All but two were on a single plant!

 I will be Dusting my tomato plants pronto, as soon as the breeze dies down. We're having regular afternoon thunderstorms right now, which means the Dust will get washed away, but frankly... after finding 14 of them, I'll Dust every afternoon if I need to, til the infestation is curbed.

Further problems include strange white marks on the leaves of my tomatoes, peas, and squash, all in about the same area of the garden: right smack in the middle. I have no idea what's causing the burn-like spots... Any ideas?

I'll be going armed this weekend: fertilizer, bug spray, Seven Dust, rose spray, and clippers. I'd enjoy having some idea what I'm up against with these strange white scald marks. Hmmm.

Zucchini Bread

What to do with all that harvest? I've brought in over 6 lbs of squash and zucchini, so I decided to bake some bread.

I love baking bread, I love zucchini... so what better than Zucchini bread?

I'm thinking about posting more on what I make with the fruits (or vegetables) of my labor. I love BLTs, sauces, and stews with tomatoes, and I often make bruschetta for my pasta. Sound fun?

Garden Update for the End of June

Growing Strong like the Tyrells.

Beefsteak tomatoes on the vine.

Squash and Zucchini plants, getting huge!

Crowder pea vines. Some pods have as many as 20 peas.

I've picked about 6.0 lbs of squash and zucchini from my four plants, and I've almost gathered a pound of cherry tomatoes from a single cherry tomato plant.

It seems like the more bounty I gather in from the garden, the more problems I encounter. I've gotten the mildew under control in the squash/zucs, but now half my yellow pear tomato decided to die. I've got black spot on the roses, and my strawberry plants, which have been under a net and really haven't been getting close attention, are full of ants and aphids.

I cut out the dead parts of the yellow pear and gathered the green tomatoes for frying. And while I haven't sprayed the roses yet, I did get the strawberries uncovered, watered, cleaned for dead leaves and branches, and sprayed for bugs. 

Work work work.

Harvesting

Totally just putting this here to brag.

First three tomatoes of the season. I generally pick them under ripe and allow them to ripen the rest of the way in my window.

I absolutely love seeing them in my window, and besides, I've already waited so long watching them grow that I jump at the chance to pick them.

I've also harvested 4lbs of squash and zucchini from my four plants so far this season.

Happy harvests to all.

Early June Update

In the Garden - 

I harvested the carrots before I left on vacation. 7 carrots. 6 oz. You cannot imagine the depths of my satisfaction and delight.

The peas are blooming, delicately purple flowers springing open on the many vines. And the tomatoes are getting taller and taller. 

 Among the Flowers - 

 

And a few shots of home - 

First Harvests and First Problems

First Squash and Zucchini 

 Look look! Behold, the first yellow crookneck (without much of a crook neck) and zucchini. The zuc was about 13 oz, and the squash was about 5. I could have left the squash out in the garden for a while longer, but... I wanted to eat it. So there.

I've got two more zuc's and three more squash on the vine, just waiting.

Since I'll be going on vacation on Wednesday, I'll probably pick anything that looks big enough to eat and take it along. I would rather enjoy it small than come back to find the bugs had gotten it.

The squash and zuc's aren't *officially* my first harvests - I've gotten several handfuls of strawberries so far, but they ARE the first produce from the stuff I planted from seed this year.

But along with the first harvest comes the first set of problems.



Before you, you see the bane of every garden - Blossom End Rot. I have it.

Blossom End Rot on Roma tomatoes.

 Of all my tomatoes, the Roma was the smallest and was showing the most flowers. I suppose it's decided to be the first with this year's set of problems. I went ahead and cut off three branches of young fruit. My thinking was - why let it stay on the plant when it's not going to turn out good anyway? I cut them up, tossed 'em in flour, and had fried green tomato bits. They didn't qualify as bites, but they were good!

I see some more starting on my yellow tomatoes, but all of my other bushes remain BER free. I will design a program of retaliation and prevention and see if I can't head it off at the pass, so to speak.

And I'll make lemonade from lemons and enjoy the green tomatoes.

Other news in the garden concerns mutant squash and zuc plants. Check out the below:

I've ended up with male flowers fused together (as many as three) and now I've got a male flower with two stamens, and on the right you can see two female flowers fused together. Neither was successfully pollinated, so I'll not have the amusing experience of getting to eat any mutant vegetables, but it was still cool to find.

Setting out the Final Additions to the Garden

I set out the last tomato on Sunday, May 26th; I also set out my bell pepper plant. The bell pepper is close to 2 months old right now (and very small still... ) and the tomato is a perfect 6-7 weeks old.

Purple Cherokee Tomato

Bell Pepper

Comparison between the new Cherokee Purple and its older counterparts. Look how tiny!

Garden Update for the last part of May

One of those quick summer showers just passed through, so I went out to snap some pics of the garden. Things are slow; we're in the wait-and-watch phase. The only work left to do at this point is to set out my Cherokee Purple and my bell pepper plant, which I am to do this weekend.

The squash are taking over my garden. Both of my hands are smaller than some of those leaves.

After a rough start, my peas have jumped! I keep expecting to see vines any day now...

The carrots, several weeks after their final thinning. There are 7. ... yes. 7.

Look! Tomatoes!

Tons of blooms on the Roma tomato.

Snapshot of the whole garden in all it's ramshackle glory.

Remember the onion bottoms? They're sprouting! And pecan tassels. They're everywhere.

Strawberry blooms!

The strawberries in their new home hanging from the banister on the back deck.

I don't mind picking strawberries one at a time. They're delicious!

Growing Onions from Discarded Pieces

White Onions

So two different onion scenarios. Last summer, I took the bottom of a white onion from the store, cut it from the onion, and planted it. The steps were very simple. I just let the cut piece dry out a little on the counter (couple of hours, maybe a day), then I stuck it cut side up in some dirt, with no dirt covering the onion.

It turned into this:

As you can see there are three different sprouts coming up. I should have split them apart, but I did not.

In the upper right corner you can see what will soon be a flower bud opening to make seeds. I didn't want that to happen; I wanted to see what I had grown.

So I dug it up.

Heh.


Here are the steps:

1. Here's what they looked like washed and with the tops cut off. I cut the bottoms off too. I will only eat the white part. No idea if that's the right thing to do or not, but that's the part you'd normally eat. It smells stronger than any onion I've never gotten in the store!

2. I cut the bottoms of the onions off (with a generous portion of the bulb material left. You can see the very large root systems here. I prepared three new pots with some dirt.

3. I placed the onion pieces in the pots and covered the roots, leaving the very top of the onion uncovered, and watered well.

So there you go. Three onions from one bottom piece. Yes, they were very small onions (and cooked down to a very small portion), but they were delicious! This time around I will be separating the shoots that come up so that the bulb growth can get larger.

Green Onions

The second onion-related project has to do with green onions. The store never sells them in small packages, so when you buy you're forced to buy in bulk, and you never use them all up in whatever recipe you follow.

Steps to growing your own green onions:

1. Secure extra onions.
2. Prepare a pot of soil, and water it well.
3. Since my pieces already had roots on it, I trimmed the green part down so that the tiny roots wouldn't have a lot to support. Then I poked each one carefully into the wet soil. If your pieces don't already have roots, I've read you can set them in glasses of water (which you frequently change), until they make roots.
4. I pressed the soil firmly around the new plants.
5. Wait.

I almost made another mess-up by leaving these in the direct sun. Now they are under my carport in shade and bright light. I'll leave them there until they show significant leaf growth, at which time they'll move into the garden spot.

So there you go. Waste not want not.

I now officially have a vegetable garden

The garden is planted!

Saturday, May 4th, mom and I set out my tomatoes at long last. I realize I had the peas, squash, and zucs already planted, but really. The tomatoes are my favorites. I was not going to be happy until they were set out. Have a look:

Five tomato plants in 5 gallon buckets. As of this writing, all of the tomatoes have flowers on them except the Yellow Pear, front right. In the background, you can see my buckets of peas. They're actually not doing so hot, and I'm afraid my seed wasn't very good after being stored for several years.

Closeup of the biggest flower buds on the Kimberly Cherry tomato.

 Also on the 4th, I potted up my seedling Cherokee tomato, at the top, and moved my bell pepper plant into a new pot as well, at the bottom.



Here is also a picture of the carrots, looking huge. Although I didn't snap a picture, I have thinned them out once more. I believe 7 carrots are now left in my container. But that's just fine with me. If they are 7 carrot-sized and carrot-shaped carrots, then I will call this experiment a success.

Squash palnts putting on new leaves. As of this writing, all four of my squash plants have the beginnings of flower buds.

I don't know if I've written about the onion. This is an onion that mom bought from the store. She cut the roots off, and I stuck the bottom with roots into a pot. That was last summer. I honestly don't know what it's doing. I'm wondering if it might bloom soon...

Last but not least, fresh strawberries from the garden! The first strawberry didn't survive long enough to have its picture taken. It straight from the plant to my mouth in a fit of glee. Oh well. Here's the second and third strawberries, to make up for that.