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Author Topic: Growing food - The Garden Thread  (Read 223471 times)

Offline pete b

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #930 on: March 03, 2016, 06:09:42 am »
I'm slightly sore: hauled in a yard of rich sandy garden soil and topped off 3 rickety beds. A full bed-load that took 6 trips in the wheelbarrow. Picked up one of those giant blue 2-wheeled barrows at lowes on sale- $109 last spring. Would have been 10 loads in a regular wheelbarrow.

Have my onion sets and carrot seeds. Hopefully I can get some romas in the ground in the next couple weeks.
Why bother with romas? The ones in the store taste pretty good. I like to focus tomato planting on good slicing tomatoes you can eat raw. Those are the kinds that just don't make it to the grocery store.
I plant 50-75 romas and paste tomatoes for canning sauce because they are prolific and resistant to late blight. I plant maybe twenty heirloom slicers and a few cherries to eat fresh in season.
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Offline kmccaf

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #931 on: March 03, 2016, 06:10:43 am »
I'm slightly sore: hauled in a yard of rich sandy garden soil and topped off 3 rickety beds. A full bed-load that took 6 trips in the wheelbarrow. Picked up one of those giant blue 2-wheeled barrows at lowes on sale- $109 last spring. Would have been 10 loads in a regular wheelbarrow.

Have my onion sets and carrot seeds. Hopefully I can get some romas in the ground in the next couple weeks.
Why bother with romas? The ones in the store taste pretty good. I like to focus tomato planting on good slicing tomatoes you can eat raw. Those are the kinds that just don't make it to the grocery store.

I don't see why it is an either/or question. I like to plant romas and other varieties.

I believe my Roma tomatoes taste much better than what i can get at the store. It is also what I use a lot of, making the fresh availability of them in the garden highly valuable. Lastly, they are a great sauce tomato.

Euge -- didn't meant to answer for you. I am jealous of your garden timeline. I did order a lot of seed last week, and will hopefully place an order for a drip irrigation soon. We will be expanding to an acre this year.

I did see my garlic is starting to come up already, and the strawberries are looking ready to wake up.
Kyle M.

Offline euge

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #932 on: March 03, 2016, 07:31:20 am »
I just happen to prefer romas and the ones at the grocer are bigger but not as tasty. They work well in the cuisine here but I mainly make a base unseasoned tomato sauce for freezing and consumption throughout the year. Ketchup also is pretty easy to make with the odds and ends and slightly reject specimens.

Grew some heirloom in 2013. Pretty substantial crop. They produced right up to the freeze. It's a good idea- might do a plant or so this year.

Found it's only really worth growing what'll get used. Tomatoes, onion, carrots, peppers, broccoli, and greens like mustard or collard. Going to try potoatoes. The first year I grew radishes. I don't really care for them and they all went to waste.

On a side note: I gave one a my friends a couple of my indeterminate roma plants last spring and they have managed to survive our very mild winter and a northern exposure. Still producing fruit.
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Offline pete b

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #933 on: March 03, 2016, 08:00:48 am »
The first year I grew radishes. I don't really care for them and they all went to waste.

Euge, try eating radishes with butter and salt as a snack on a nice late spring/early summer afternoon sitting in the sun drinking a saison. You'll care for them then I bet.
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Offline euge

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #934 on: March 03, 2016, 08:07:39 am »
The first year I grew radishes. I don't really care for them and they all went to waste.

Euge, try eating radishes with butter and salt as a snack on a nice late spring/early summer afternoon sitting in the sun drinking a saison. You'll care for them then I bet.

The French way!

I'll plant some and try. :D Also I think they pickle well with jalapenos. Or is that turnip...?
The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool. -Richard P. Feynman

Laws are spider-webs, which catch the little flies, but cannot hold the big ones. -Anacharsis

Offline pete b

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #935 on: March 03, 2016, 08:17:32 am »
The first year I grew radishes. I don't really care for them and they all went to waste.

Euge, try eating radishes with butter and salt as a snack on a nice late spring/early summer afternoon sitting in the sun drinking a saison. You'll care for them then I bet.

The French way!

I'll plant some and try. :D Also I think they pickle well with jalapenos. Or is that turnip...?
When I have too much I grate them and pickle them to use as a condiment on sandwiches and salads.
Don't let the bastards cheer you up.

Offline reverseapachemaster

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #936 on: March 03, 2016, 08:24:34 am »
There's still a slight chance the weather will dip under 40F at night so I'm holding off on any planting for another week or two. I have my peppers and ground cherries overwintered in the house and ready to go. I'll probably add another jalapeno plant and look for the thai basil to sprout from the seeds that blew into the ground.
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Offline kmccaf

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #937 on: March 03, 2016, 08:48:03 am »
If anybody would like some Carolina Reaper seeds, let me know. They go for $1 for a seed, and I was given quite a few peppers. I plan on growing them as ornamentals, and for some hot sauce.
Kyle M.

Offline klickitat jim

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #938 on: March 03, 2016, 02:40:04 pm »
I just happen to prefer romas and the ones at the grocer are bigger but not as tasty. They work well in the cuisine here but I mainly make a base unseasoned tomato sauce for freezing and consumption throughout the year. Ketchup also is pretty easy to make with the odds and ends and slightly reject specimens.

Grew some heirloom in 2013. Pretty substantial crop. They produced right up to the freeze. It's a good idea- might do a plant or so this year.

Found it's only really worth growing what'll get used. Tomatoes, onion, carrots, peppers, broccoli, and greens like mustard or collard. Going to try potoatoes. The first year I grew radishes. I don't really care for them and they all went to waste.

On a side note: I gave one a my friends a couple of my indeterminate roma plants last spring and they have managed to survive our very mild winter and a northern exposure. Still producing fruit.
Potatoes... our soil here is what they call "peanut butter" its so muddy in winter and rock hard in summer. So it takes some conditioning. A trick we've been using is to dig 2cf holes in the rows that need more loam, then we fill the holes with miracle grow potting soil, we plant taters in that. They do wicked awesome. Then the next year all that potting soil gets tilled in and we move to the next row... its a great way to keep the garden conditioned, rotating, and grow killer taters all at the same time.

Offline euge

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #939 on: March 03, 2016, 03:31:44 pm »
That's a great idea as we have heavy clay soil in my area. It's fertile but not really great for the home garden. Pretty much glue when wet, concrete when semi-dry and friable when bone dry. That's when one digs holes IMO. My solution was raised beds.
The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool. -Richard P. Feynman

Laws are spider-webs, which catch the little flies, but cannot hold the big ones. -Anacharsis

Offline AmandaK

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #940 on: March 06, 2016, 12:28:02 pm »
Finally got around to starting peppers.


And built a new little PVC seed starting apparatus. I have plans for 26 pepper plants, and will probably start about twice that so I can select for the healthiest ones.


Going to plant some snap peas and various greens today after studying some more.
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Offline HoosierBrew

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #941 on: March 06, 2016, 12:41:39 pm »
Awesome looking collection of seeds, Amanda. I grow chiles too, but the Red Savina Habanero is my ceiling for heat. The Reaper is too much fun (or misery) for me. Enjoy!
Jon H.

Offline euge

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #942 on: March 06, 2016, 02:33:25 pm »
Finally got all my onion sets in and the forecast is rain the next several days. Hopefully it is just right and they get a thorough soak and not a beating.

Inserted some kohlrabi and roma seeds among them in key places. And scattered some carrot seeds about.

I made furrows and planted the sets along the ridges in hopes they'll have an easier time pushing dirt away.
The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool. -Richard P. Feynman

Laws are spider-webs, which catch the little flies, but cannot hold the big ones. -Anacharsis

Offline AmandaK

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #943 on: March 06, 2016, 08:07:52 pm »
Awesome looking collection of seeds, Amanda. I grow chiles too, but the Red Savina Habanero is my ceiling for heat. The Reaper is too much fun (or misery) for me. Enjoy!

Oh I'm not eating the Reapers or even going near them after they start fruiting! I have what my friends here call a "baby mouth". So the Numex Sauve Orange and Zavory Habenaro are for me, while the Reapers, Scotch Bonnets, and real Habenaros are for the husband and his hot sauces. I had to leave the house when hot sauce was being made last fall (Ghost, Habs, and Serranos I think).

The Numez and Zavory are supposedly a very mild version of Habenaros... so maybe I'll be able to eat them!  :D The hottest I can do is some Poblanos, but the Tiburons I grew last year were as hot as they were prolific so I didn't get to eat much of them. :/
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Offline euge

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Re: Growing food - The Garden Thread
« Reply #944 on: March 07, 2016, 06:04:36 am »
I watched this over the weekend. They go for the Carolina Reaper... :o

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9k-SBpElcWA&sns=em

Way too funny!
The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool. -Richard P. Feynman

Laws are spider-webs, which catch the little flies, but cannot hold the big ones. -Anacharsis