Early Summer
Hey y’all. Strawberries have been picked, Mr. E wrapped his first season of Tball on Monday, Kindergarten ends next week, the community pool opens this Saturday … summer has arrived.
Garden-wise, the past month has been all leafy greens, all the time. But now the spinach is long gone and I just yanked all my bolting lettuce plants last Saturday to make room for other stuff. All told, I harvested 3 lbs. of spinach and around 6 lbs. of lettuce. I’m pretty happy with that. Cut a few heads of broccoli yesterday with more to come. Kale’s up and ready, but the Mrs. hasn’t had a hankering for it yet and neither have I, so it will stay there for a while. The arugula I left to its own devices. Beets are still growing as no critters have pilfered them (yet). But the peas aren’t doing so well. When it was time to plant, the 2nd bed wasn’t ready yet and I chose a spot that doesn’t get sun until 11am or so, thus the anemic growth. Next year they’ll get better treatment.
Been getting the potatoes (Yukon Gold, Russian Banana Fingerling) established for almost a month now in the grow bags. The dirt is near the brim, so nothing to do now except wait until August. With the lettuce gone, I put in my pepper seedlings (bell, jalapeno) and pole beans (Fortex). The new raised bed has the majority of my tomato seedlings, along with three bush bean (Provider) seedlings and some corn (Dorinny).
And so I find myself out of room with melon, cucumber and squash seedlings in waiting. Not to worry dear readers, I got a sunny spot all scoped out, soon to be cleared. Landscaping be damned.
For documentation’s sake, a final list of crops planted: spinach, lettuce, swiss chard, kale, arugula, broccoli, beets, bell peppers, jalapeno peppers, peas, potatoes, tomatoes, pole beans, bush beans, corn, melons, squash, zucchini, cucumbers.
WOW, your garden is rocking! Do you find NJ more farming friendly than Maine or just different? We didn’t plant as much this year and of course we use containers anyway which aren’t as bountiful. Nothing is near close to harvest yet so I’ve been hitting a local organic urban farmers market weekly for my veggie fix 🙂 We’re going on an Urban Farm tour this weekend (http://urbanfarmstourkc.com), should be fun and inspiring! Happy Summer!
Thanks. We’ve had a good bit of heat the last week, so everything’s really picking up steam. No worries, I’m also in purgatory until my warm weather stuff starts to produce. NJ and Maine have a lot of similarities farm-wise in that there are a lot of them, plenty of pick-your-own options for apples, berries, etc, and farmers markets abound. Maplewood and many of the burbs around here have community garden plots that are full each season. I think the main difference is CSAs (few and far between in this area) and actually getting produce at the farmers markets/farms directly from farmers. Maine seems to be more focused and have more options (esp. organic options) in that area than NJ. I don’t think that’s the fault of the farmers, I think folks around here are used to getting their produce at the store or having food delivered via FreshDirect or another grocery delivery service. Now, an Urban Farm Tour, we definitely don’t have! That’s great.
The Urban Farm tour was AMAZING! Are you familiar with aquaponics? (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aquaponics) One of my neighbors has a huge 6 tank system with 1000 tilapia in their backyard! It’s so awesome, they have hydroponic plants growing above the tanks, fed by the fish water…the whole system blew my mind!
Awesome. Recently familiar with aquaponics. I’ve been reading about this guy Will Allen (http://www.growingpower.org/) for a few years – he transforms urban areas into gardens with soilless growing mediums that include aquaponic systems like what you saw. Very inspiring. Favorite quote: “We need 50 million more people growing food, on porches, in pots, in side yards.”