This summer we have been hard at work maintaining garden moisture while trying to keep up with our weeding and successive planting. Successive planting essentially means that you are continually planting and adding to your garden as the season persists and/or while you harvest. For instance, when you pull up a delicious beet, put another seed in the ground - it could be another beet, a radish, or perhaps heirloom lettuce- and you'll be harvesting again soon enough! You must take care to consider when the plant will mature, how big it will get, if it will cast shadow on the crops, (sometimes you may want that- to shade a lettuce crop, for example) and ultimately, know what you want to eat.
This year we have done the best yet, but we've had help from our dear friend Miss Judy who started a few more plants in her cold frame (article 2) than she was able to use. Her generosity became a successive planting of cabbages, cucumber, kale and lettuces - what a treat!
This year we have done the best yet, but we've had help from our dear friend Miss Judy who started a few more plants in her cold frame (article 2) than she was able to use. Her generosity became a successive planting of cabbages, cucumber, kale and lettuces - what a treat!
We didn't have all our beds planted with our desired crops when we were given the starts because we had been planting different beds as time allowed, since April. This was some substantial work as we let the garden go fallow last year (with the exception of Jr. Farmer's plots), enjoying only those plants that grew on their own. Consequently, the beds were full of plants we didn't need or want. I hesitate to say weeds because we ended up using so much. Thankfully we had a lot of native amaranth (pig weed), chickweed, dock, clover, lambs quarters, and thistles in the beds that were harvested as food for Miss Dixie, the sheep, and rabbits. Yes, we were surprised to learn how much the sheep love thistle! Other beds were full to the brim with either mint or Chinese lantern that had grown to jungle thickness. It is no small task to get all the roots and plant matter with those! We were blessed to be able to give a LOT of plants away, but found ourselves transplanting a number of lemon balm bushes too. We are still finding and removing errant plants, not to mention the weeding... |
Making room for more plants meant that we had to find ways to grow them upwards. I had learned years ago from a friend that hog panels work well for garden arches and we have found they support peas, beans, cucumbers and even squash! Miss Judy grew all her cucumbers on trellis and said, 'They can climb!' So we doubled up a couple of panel pieces we had, secured them with t-posts & bailing twine and hoped for the best. Mom has had to help them learn to climb and Miss Judy found this year that hers weren't wanting to stay on the trellis so well. We are finding they grow so long, that they are now sharing the bean trellis too! The honey bees LOVE the cucumber flowers and you can just hear their busy buzz as you harvest, water, or just enjoy the garden.
Another way we had tried to ease our garden work was by delaying plantings. Lil' Miss had planted her cabbages after Jr. Farmer, and Mom planted hers thereafter. This gives us 3 different harvest times and makes it a bit easier than having everything ready to glean at once. We also have later season plantings of summer and winter squash as twice our plantings weren't successful and we found this to be true for several of our gardening friends. Just before we went on our Idaho trip, Mom dug in sheep manure and planted this bed with the extra squash starts after a corn planting attempt didn't work. There is so much trial and error every year! Sometimes you have challenges with the seed, sometimes the weather, sometimes the soil, often it's really time. When you can make the time, you can keep experimenting and bring something to fruition. We make it a habit to pray over our garden work as well. It really does make a difference; and according to one state worker, they have studies to prove it!
Another point to remember, once you pick your produce, it starts losing nutritional value so the better prepared you are to use it for a meal or preservation, the more value your bodies will glean when consumed.
Another point to remember, once you pick your produce, it starts losing nutritional value so the better prepared you are to use it for a meal or preservation, the more value your bodies will glean when consumed.
Speaking of consuming, we have been harvesting so much and finding ways to use it and store it in a way that preserves the most nutritional value and will serve our needs in the months when we cannot grow them. Lil' Miss has been gathering cucumber since July and we've used them in our water, in our summer burgers, fresh salads and slices with just a dab of cream cheese or dipped in balsamic vinegar - both can be enhanced with a dash of 'Real Salt'. Our friends, the Burkholder's, have been enjoying theirs with a bit of sour cream and salt, paired with a delicious tomato slice, yum! Another friend, Miss Mary, encouraged us to harvest them young for more crisp pickles and to help get a jump on what will undoubtedly be a substantial harvest once the plants are at their peak. We think peak time is now for Lil' Miss and Mom's second planting is on it's way. We've been researching lacto-fermented pickles and believe this is what we'll be doing with much of the harvest.
We hope this encourages you to get out and get your hands dirty with some gardening delights. Have a great time and let us know if you have some especially spectacular experiences!
We hope this encourages you to get out and get your hands dirty with some gardening delights. Have a great time and let us know if you have some especially spectacular experiences!
Blessed is every one that feareth the LORD; that walketh in his ways. For thou shalt eat the labour of thine hands: happy shalt thou be, and it shall be well with thee. Psalm 128: 1-2