Seriously.

I've been so negligent in posting, mainly because I haven't needed to spend much time in the garden and therefore hadn't taken any recent photos. I had every intention of snapping a few pictures this morning. Nothing fancy, just beet tops and fennel that I've observed at dusk when I can't manage a decent photo. So imagine my surprise when I awoke to this...

Any idea what this might mean for the beets? Or the kale, fennel, or cauliflower? I think we are a little past "frost" at this stage, no?

Season's End

I'd like to say that I'm not quite as negligent a gardener as I am a blogger.  I've been taking care of my plants, but there hasn't been much to write about.  In all honesty, this summer was a big bummer and I've spent the past several weeks trying to figure out what went wrong.  Sure, the weather was a big factor -- the "cold" spell we had for much of August was the worst possible timing for the hot-weather plants that I'd filled my garden with.   Also, the soil -- I had set out for this to be a "re-building year" of sorts, but I still expected things to grow.  I probably harvested less than 2 dozen tomatoes from 10 plants.  I will maybe get one eggplant.  

This year's artichoke experiment was a failure as well.  The plant was neither pretty nor contained artichokes (but it did grow to be HUGE).

But, as down as I feel about this now, there were some successes and a few surprises.  The cucumber plants started out shaky but in the end they were my highest-producing plant, and we now have plenty of pickles!

I also harvested enough cayenne peppers to get us through several football seasons (my favorite use is to dry them and use in chili), and the mystery squash turned out to be a spaghetti squash. 

 

Over the next week I'll work on cleaning out the garden and then throwing down a nice layer of compost before I research cover crops to plant.  I'll take whatever measures I can now to ensure a better season next year.  

Bad apples.

Ugh... we really have a problem!  It is the first year that our Macintosh apple tree is producing any considerable fruit, and something is seriously wrong... Sadly, I know nothing about apple trees so am sending this out to the blogosphere for help.  Any advice is appreciated.

Soft focus for emphasis only; I wasn't trying to make this pretty.

Case file: Zucchini

I think I've cracked the case of the Huge Zucchini Plant with No Zucchini!

After many hours wasted looking online, watching videos about hand-pollinating zucchini, trying to hand-pollinate zucchini, and then having no other option but to blame and bemoan the state of the dwindling bee population... it turns out the culprit all along was my soil!

The soil I had so industriously and regularly supplemented with 10-10-10 fertilizer may actually have had perilously high nitrogen levels, which prevent the formation of fruit!  (learned in my gardening class, supported by multiple Google searches)  Huge leaves, but no fruit.  Two summers in a row.  Two summers of the same fertilizer, industriously and regularly applied.  Two different zucchini transplants, two others planted from two separate packets of seeds...  and when they weren't growing, I added more fertilizer.  The common denominator?  The soil. 

Step one is not adding any more of that 10-10-10 fertilizer!  Then checking the results of the soil test to see what other things I may need to do.  My hypothesis at this time is that the pH of my soil is high, which would indicate high nitrogen levels (I think). 

Summer's Final Friday Failure

Remember the replacement zucchini?  Well, it did eventually flower, and there seemed to be progress...

...until there just wasn't any progress.  They stayed looking like this for about 2 weeks, at which point, with a great sigh of resignation, I pulled the plants out of the ground.

Herbs, part I

This week begins a series of posts about herbs.  I have the following growing in various locations in my garden and yard: thyme, basil, oregano, tarragon, sage, and parsley.  Do you notice what is missing from that list?  Cilantro.  I would love, love to grow cilantro, but have never gotten more than a few leaves... which, granted, is enough to sprinkle on a salad or on top of a dinner... but when you've got 75% of the other ingredients for salsa growing outside, it sure would be nice to have enough for an actual recipe!

 That has totally not happened.

At this point in the summer, I've given up on the cilantro completely.  It does not seem to do well in heat, and it "bolts" quickly - meaning, it goes from having flavorful leaves to producing seeds.  The seeds are known as coriander.

They are not what I put in salsa.

Occasionally, the plants just do what this one did above, which is die.  Pretty much, this endeavor is not worth the time and energy.  So I'll keep paying 99 cents for a bunch of the stuff at the store or farmer's market! 

Another Friday failure?

After the Zucchini Fertility Debacle, I planted some more seeds with the hopes of being able to fertilize them by hand if needed, just so I could get some zucchini this summer.

Not sure that it's going to happen.  Although they are growing, there is nary a flower in sight.  Sad day in the backyard farm.

Uh oh.

I found this awaiting me the other day.  I was unable to zoom in any closer, but even in this version I am sure you can tell there is something seriously wrong with that tomato... but notice the other one that looks fine.  I do not know the cause of this (yet.... or possibly ever), but I went ahead and removed not just the tomato but the entire "branch" to which it was attached.   Maybe I lost some other potentially healthy tomatoes in the process (see those little flowers to the left?), or maybe it was a necessary sacrifice to keep the rest of the plant safe.  I will be monitoring this one closely....

two ripe strawberries / does this count as a Friday failure?

The tomatoes, they've only just begun, and keep on coming... but the strawberries?  This may be it, my friends.  To give you an idea of scale, the small one is the size of a chickpea.

Friday failures, Part 3

Plants that aren't edible are sadly not my strong point, though this is about the worst it has ever been.

(BUT... after taking this picture, I got some great advice from a friend who told me to just pluck off the dead flowers... and seriously, 2 days later, they look fantastic)

Sometimes, admitting a failure is all it takes to learn how to fix it!

You know your zucchini has a fertility problem if...

...it looks like this:

Here are some telltale signs... very little flower action (check), tiny little zucchinis that do not grow, but shrivel up and die (check), leaves much larger than a human head torso (CHECK).

Friday Failures, Part 2

Do I even need to include text with this picture?

I planted these small pots of parsley and cilantro, thinking they'd be the perfect size to keep on the windowsill of the kitchen.

Turns out they were a tiny bit too big for the windowsill.  And, oh yeah, not suitable for consumption.

(I have no explanation for why they are still sitting on my deck)

Fortunately, I have had a little more luck with cilantro planted into the ground... it is still a challenging little herb, though (more on that later).

Friday Failures, part 1

I need to come clean and share with you that the backyard farm isn't all success.  So from time to time I'll let you in on some of our failures.  Here's the first of several upcoming installments...

I mentioned (and have shared photographic proof of this fact) that I do keep it pretty tight in the ground portion of our garden.  Everyone has their row, and the rows are arranged alphabetically, or by plant type (i.e., salad is all in one place; tomatoes are next to each other).  I weed that area at least once a week (easy to do while the plants are small; much bigger job once they start to grow) and it's generally kind of nice looking.