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Author Topic: Growing food - The Garden Thread  (Read 223494 times)

Offline klickitat jim

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #690 on: April 28, 2014, 08:07:32 pm »
Woo hoo! We have new tenants in the greenhouse birdhouse. A few pairs of Western Bluebirds

Offline redbeerman

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #691 on: April 29, 2014, 05:50:18 am »
Planted snow peas, sugar snap peas, beets, lettuces, spinach, leeks, kohlrabi this past weekend.  Asparagus are coming on like spring madness.

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Offline erockrph

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #692 on: April 29, 2014, 06:14:13 am »
It's been a long winter and I have the jones to get out in the garden worse than usual. You guys certainly aren't helping :)

I did get my onion plants in last week, so I guess the garden is officially underway for the season. But I won't feel like I'm really started until I can plant my peas and root veggies in the next week or so. Right now I've been coming home from work in the afternoon and walking around my empty garden. It's just not the same.
Eric B.

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Offline euge

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #693 on: April 29, 2014, 07:21:04 am »
My onions are coming along nicely. A bit small currently, but I think there is too much wood in my soil and it's sucking all the extra nitrogen out despite my application of manure pre-planting.

Haven't planted anything else because my garden is going to transform once again. Bringing in fresh fertile soil and I may expand the growing area as well.

And a drip system. So far the hugelkulture has yet to realize it's full benefits.
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Offline Pinski

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #694 on: April 29, 2014, 09:42:46 am »
It's been a long winter and I have the jones to get out in the garden worse than usual. You guys certainly aren't helping :)

I did get my onion plants in last week, so I guess the garden is officially underway for the season. But I won't feel like I'm really started until I can plant my peas and root veggies in the next week or so. Right now I've been coming home from work in the afternoon and walking around my empty garden. It's just not the same.
Yes, but that's how you build the vision. Think of it as planning.
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Offline 1vertical

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #695 on: September 08, 2014, 10:18:19 am »
Frost and SNOW thursday....cold rain tomorra....she is Over.  The mater plants are hung upside down
in the barn....see what we get from there.  Carrots are still ok in the ground for a while longer.
A few little okra and one cherry tomato plant is all that remains...
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Offline morticaixavier

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #696 on: September 08, 2014, 10:54:12 am »
Frost and SNOW thursday....cold rain tomorra....she is Over.  The mater plants are hung upside down
in the barn....see what we get from there.  Carrots are still ok in the ground for a while longer.
A few little okra and one cherry tomato plant is all that remains...

The joy of living in the northern tier. Our garden is just starting to really produce some maters. we got them in late because of the barley. Peppers (Fish hot pepper) are doing well. they are variegated, both the leaves and pods. mildly spicey. beans are getting plump for seed. amaranth is almost ready I think (just a couple plants for fun). pumpkins are getting nicely yellow.

thinking about getting broccoli, lettuce and peas in pretty soon here.
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Offline kmccaf

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #697 on: September 08, 2014, 11:05:13 am »
Even with a lot of bugs eating the tomatoes and green beans, we had a great garden this year. Still produced more than we could eat, but would have been nice to have a bigger surplus. However, the second planting of green beans does not look promising. Some bugs have totally eaten the leaves through, just leaving the veins. I'm really sad about it cause this was a variety I had never had. Peppers are still coming in strong as well.

My hops are pretty spectacular this year as well. Got about 2 lbs dried from the Brewer's Gold (2nd yr), and they just smell incredible. New hops these year had great growth with the Crystal bine giving me about 2 oz dried. Pacific Gem, Santium, and Mt. Hood yielded a handful of hops each. Super Alpha is a massive plant, and it is still growing. Side arms are about 5 feet long!
Kyle M.

Offline jeffy

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #698 on: September 08, 2014, 01:08:22 pm »
Our avocado tree did really well this year.  We've been eating one or two a day for over a month now and giving some away to appreciative friends and still have at least 15 on the tree.  I just wish the birds or squirrels would stop taking tasting them - I find one on the ground with a little bite out of it almost every day.  Bastards.
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Offline corkybstewart

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #699 on: September 08, 2014, 02:41:02 pm »
Our tomatoes made it through the summer heat and are finally starting to produce more than we can eat daily.  That's all I planted this year for food.
My hops have done OK, but a leafhopper infestation took most of the leaves off completely.  They're coming back and I'm seeing lots of new burrs.  I've already gotten about 10 oz's of Cascade(dried) and we still have a couple of months of fall growing season left.
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Offline pete b

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #700 on: September 08, 2014, 07:52:47 pm »
It was a good year for the garden. We had the soil tested for the first time and remineralized which seemed to be a big boost. Tons of kale up to my chest and cooking and preserving tons of zucchini. Blanched and froze beans and turned the napa cabbage into kimchi. We have green cabbage the size of basketballs and huge leeks, brussels sprouts and parsnips. Also a good year for all kinds of peppers and eggplant. We harvested garlic a couple weeks ago and its huge, tasty and curing well.The onions did decent too. I'm looking forward to a full root cellar and freezer and a winter without grocery stores.
The disappointments this year were late blight on the tomatoes, blight on the potatoes, a weak peach crop due to mold, and varmits getting to my barley. I harvested, dried, and froze a little under a pound each of cascade and galena though. Also, we'll still have enough potatoes and at least we have about 80 plants of sauce tomatoes that we are not totally losing to the blight so we'll can a goodly amount of sauce.
Don't let the bastards cheer you up.

Offline pete b

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #701 on: September 08, 2014, 07:59:14 pm »
Our avocado tree did really well this year.  We've been eating one or two a day for over a month now and giving some away to appreciative friends and still have at least 15 on the tree.  I just wish the birds or squirrels would stop taking tasting them - I find one on the ground with a little bite out of it almost every day.  Bastards.
Same problem with chipmunks and tomatoes and beets. If only they would just take one whole one instead of a bite of ten!
Don't let the bastards cheer you up.

Offline kmccaf

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #702 on: November 03, 2014, 08:14:56 am »
Think I'm going to pull up the tomato cages later on. I got one last tomato yesterday, and a few peppers. Plants are all dead now. Surprisingly, my Brewer's Gold bine had a ton of hops on it, so I picked about 6-7 ozs dried last week. They smelled just incredible. Some of my herbs are still good, although I think I will pick them all and dry those as well. My Super Alpha bine started producing burrs a couple of weeks ago, like a ton of them. It's a real shame that the frost killed them. That really is a bine for the more southern latitudes. May be a good option for growers in the southern portion of the country. I will probably move over the winter, so no garlic planting this year. Need to dig up the hops as well, which I am not looking forward to.
Kyle M.

Offline klickitat jim

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #703 on: November 03, 2014, 04:57:36 pm »
I noticed when I watered tge greenhouse yeserday that my poblanos are blooming again.

Offline pinnah

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #704 on: November 07, 2014, 10:52:25 am »
Woo, the garden thread laid unattended for the growing season!  Sorry about that.

Glad to hear folks had a good season. 
Still picking the last of the raspberries here.
Liked the Creeper on my Nugget tower.



Time to clean up and get some compost on the show. 
Glad to hear that greenhouse worked out Jim!


Surprisingly, my Brewer's Gold bine had a ton of hops on it, so I picked about 6-7 ozs dried last week. They smelled just incredible.

Interesting!  I have been mulling the use of bine-dried hops for some time.  Let us know how they work out if you use them.