Weather Talk

We're finding the weather here is quite different from Springfield. No real surprise there, right? But one thing in particular that we've noticed is the WIND.  Last night it was so windy we could hardly sleep.  It blew open our fence gates, tearing off the latch in the process.  At least one tree in town went down and through a roof. We had some shingles on our lawn this morning.

It seems to primarily come from the west, and blows straight across our hillside in back where we plan to put the garden.  Right now Jason is fixing the gates, and reinforcing them several different ways, as tonight apparently there are supposed to be gusts up to 50 mph. If it's like this in the summer at all, it will wreak havoc on any garden.  So I've started to think about interplanting shrubs on the slope, between the aspens, to act as a windbreak for my little veggies next year.

We're reconsidering the shed design as well. Perhaps we will go back to the plan where the roof line being just above the fence and sloping up.  We're wondering if that would handle the wind better than a typical A-line roof.
Also, when I went out just a minute ago, it was hailing. Pea size, and not enough to pile up anywhere.

It has been a very rainy fall.  In fact, today when I felt some warmth on my arm in the kitchen, I thought I had left a burner on.  Nope, it was just sunlight coming through the window.  Oh yeah, that's what that feels like!

According to the weather man, it should snow by the end of this week, if not next.

Garden Evaluation: Tomatoes

Box 2: Tomatoes + Green Zebras from Box 1 (okra will be on another post)
Planted May 12
small plants purchased from hardware stores and nursery

5 varieties: 'Sun Sugar' (orange/yellow cherry tomato), 'Mr. Stripey' (red w/ orange stripes), 'Jubilee' (yellow, low-acid), 'Champion' (red slicer), and 'Green Zebra.'

These were just starting to come on when we moved. Leann said that by the end of August, she was having to give tomatoes away, because they were producing more than her family could eat.
They seemed to do much better in their own box, without having to compete with squash and everything else for space and sunlight.  We need some bigger, taller, stronger tomato cages.  The 3-4 foot tall cone shaped ones we had were very quickly outgrown, and even our 5-foot tall trellis wasn't enough.

Mr. Stripey I didn't see much of before the move.  Leann told me they had fantastic flavor, but there weren't very many of them.

Jubilee, again, didn't see any of these before the move.

Champion was an experiment to see how it compared to 'Better Boy' from last summer. At least prior to the move, yield was much less with Champion.   

The 2 Sun Sugar plants were extra vigorous and needed extra support beyond trellis and tomato cage. Delicious flavor.

Green Zebras seemed prolific, but I was never sure when to pick them, so I ended up leaving almost all of them for Leann to pick.  I don't think we tasted them even.

Secret Garden tomatoes!

This was the thrill of my garden planting!  All these "weeds" popping up in every box turned out to be tomato plants.  All season long last year when a cherry tomato was rotten or something, I often would just toss into the box for compost next year. Little did I know so many would grow in the spring! I literally must have pulled out close to a hundred plants.  They even grew their very own tomato jungle behind one of the boxes, between the box and the fence--in hard-packed, dog-run ground.  Don't know how they even survived back there, let alone grew back in the spring.

I let the one growing with my peas continue on.  It was a strange mix of the 2 cherry tomato varieties from the year before: 'Sweet 100' and 'Sun Sugar.'  The tomatoes were kind of a pink-ish color, with flavor more like the red cherry tomatoes than the orange.

Garden Evaluation: potatoes, peas, beets, onions

Attempts at Evaluating from Afar

Since I was not there for the end of the season, I'm not going to try to do the extensive evaluation I did last year.  Just a few general comments from what I can remember, plus some of what Leann told me.

Box 4: spring veggies: potatoes, peas, beets, onions
planted: March 31

Potatoes: 'Yukon Gold'
It seems like I planted one other variety too, possibly just a russet, but I don't remember. Our harvest was all Yukon Gold. Like last year, these were done by early July. Maybe with such a quick growing time, they would be a good bet for our Washington garden next summer. They got nice and bushy, as you can see below.

Peas: 'Super Snappy'
Didn't have as many germinate as I had hoped. I don't think I soaked them overnight before planting this year.  I'll have to go back to that next year. Once they grew, didn't have as big a yield either.  I planted 4 squares worth, so 32.  I maybe got half that growing. I'm wondering if it was the other variety that gave us the big yield last year.  Next year we'll plant more than one variety again.
Jacob and I enjoyed picking and eating them fresh. Big peas and crunchy, sweet pods.

Beets: don't remember variety
I need to figure out when to thin them.  They were tasty, but small. We liked the beet greens steamed, as well (tasted like spinach.) Could see us doing more of these next summer.  They were good for some variety on the table.

 All those greens with teeny-tiny beets at the bottom.

These were a little better-sized, probably because I had picked some already, thus thinning them out.

Onions: yellow
Got a few. I didn't plant as closely as square foot recommended, but I probably could have. Not true slicer size, but seemed a mellower flavor than last year.

Fall colors

 The golden leaves of this aspen in our backyard thrill me every time I look at them.  Especially side-by-side with the almost lime green and rust orange of these trees (below), plus the deep green of the pine tree here.

It has been a long time since we've had beautiful trees on our property.  

And a bonus that our neighbors have such beauty peeking over the fence on all sides.

Goodbye

Goodbye 3 trees!

Goodbye junipers!

Goodbye cottoneasters!

Wow, that felt good, and I wasn't the one driving the tractor!  Without all this superfluous greenery there is now mental and physical space to contemplate change. Our current thoughts are one retaining wall all the way around in front, with grassy slope leading down to it and flowers/small shrubs planted in front.

Part of flower bed possibilities will depend on how far back from the street the wall is placed.  We had the utility companies come out and mark lines, and we've got electric and tv lines all along in front, parallel to the street.  So I wouldn't be able to plant anything right there, unless the wall was back far enough that roots wouldn't interfere with the lines. Not sure what else we would put right there, though.  Junipers?

Garden Terraces

 It was just too discouraging digging this out by hand, so Jason rented some big equipment.

3 terraces going up the hill: just need cleaning up a little, and keystone blocks put in.

Mountain Ash

...and Diamond.
This is on the far end of our garden boxes, right at the bottom of the slope.  If it grows to its full height, it will probably shade the garden.  Which means it should come out or be transplanted. But it has such pretty color, I'm thinking now perhaps it would be worth it to transplant it to the East side yard while it's still small enough to handle.

[10/2012: recently found out this is actually a staghorn sumac, so it probably won't grow too much taller.]