Archive for Gardening
Grow Your Own – Number Five Is Alive
by John Weckerle
Bed 4, at just a little over 3 weeks after planting.
A few weeks ago, we posted an article on the completion of Bed 4, a dual-layer partially raised bed surrounding an old juniper skeleton that had been planted with a trumpet vine. We are pleased to report that the concept appears to be functioning very well. With the exception of much of the chard (alas, rabbits) and a couple of snow peas that were in questionable shape when they went into the ground, the plants have all adjusted to their new surroundings and appear to be flourishing; there’s even a green bell pepper or two on the way. This afternoon, we noted the presence of what appears to be a “volunteer” tomato plant (from the household compost, no doubt). The trumpet vine survived the winter – rather unexpectedly – and with the enriched soil and additional moisture, there’s a good bet we’ll be making some hummingbirds very, very happy.
In that article, we alluded to the construction of Bed 5, the latest of our horticultural/agricultural experiments. Like Beds 1 through 3, which are lying fallow this year and will likely be relocated and repurposed, Bed 5 is a raised bed. But it’s much more than just a raised bed. Drum roll…
Grow Your Own – The Things Around The Middle
by John Weckerle
In our previous article, Grow Your Own – The Thing In The Middle, we showed the initial construction of the two-level, circular bed for vegetables and flowers, now designated as Bed 4. Since then, we’ve completed the setup and planted the bed.
Round bed showing soaker hose
Our first photo this morning serves the purpose of illustrating the soaker hose placement. The upper layer has a single circle of hose, while the lower – which is wider and supporting more plants – has two. A couple of tips for working with soaker hose: 1) leave it out in the sun for a bit to soften it up before placement, which makes it easier to work with; and 2) use some inexpensive landscape staples to hold it in place as you work your way around/through your project. In this photo (taken May 7), a few of the colder-weather varieties are already in the ground and awaiting mulch. Now that things have warmed up, we’ve added some of the other veggies, as shown in the second photo, taken this morning.
Grow Your Own – Tea Time!
by John Weckerle
Here in the New Mexico Central region, our soils tend to need a little help when we call on them to help us produce food, whether for us or the wildlife. The soils at NM-Central.com headquarters tend to be relatively low in organic matter, as do the soils where many of our readers live. This means adding various materials – peat moss, compost, manure, etc., depending on the use – to the soil for some of our plantings. Now and again, especially for growing trees and veggies, we occasionally throw in another amendment – compost tea.
Compost tea is almost exactly what it sounds like – a brew of compost and water. Unlike the tea we drink, though, it’s not boiled or heated; air is pumped through the mix to support rapid growth of microorganisms present in the compost. Compost tea helps us add organic material to the soil and jump-start the microbial ecosystem in the soil, making it more fertile and helping to protect plants from disease. Many compost tea enthusiasts tout its advantages, including healthier, faster-growing, more productive plants. While many people make compost tea in large quantities, good results can be realized in smaller scales, right down to the five-gallon bucket range. Making compost tea is fairly easy, with the bulk of the preparation taking about 10-15 minutes and the equipment costing very little.
Equipment - Air pump, tubing, valve controller, diffusers, and weights
Grow Your Own – The Thing In The Middle
Circular bed for vegetables and flowers.
by John Weckerle
Well, it wouldn’t be Spring here at New Mexico Central if we weren’t trying to come up with new and interesting ways to grow things that – we hope – will end up taking a trip through our digestive systems. This week, we began work on a new type of bed, this time one that we adapted from something we saw in Sunset Magazine. It’s a two-tiered, sort-of-circular bed that is intended not only to produce vegetables, but also to provide some ornamental value. In our version, we used 5.5-inch tall, wood-grained, plastic edging (the Sunset version used corrugated aluminum, which also looked good, but we saw the plastic first and thought it would look nice). There were other, somewhat less expensive edgings, but we liked this one because it was taller than most – also, it contains a good bit of recycled plastic.
Senior Gardening Correspondent Wilson and his crew waited until after lunch to get started. With the help of Assistant Editor Lucy, we did a “quick and dirty” (get it?) layout, and then your editor began digging. Using a turning fork, we loosened up the soil around the central feature to a diameter of about 9 feet and a depth of 8 inches to a foot, give or take a bit, breaking up dirt clods as we went along (we’ve got a bit of clay in the ol’ New Mexico Central soil). We then turned in two bales of peat moss and one bag each of steer manure and composted cotton burr, first turning in one bale of peat moss, and then doing another turn with the rest. Why the multiple turns? Well, for one thing, it helped further break up the clods. For another, this helped us achieve a nice, even mix of native and organic material.
Grow Your Own – Time To Start Digging!
by John Weckerle
Well, it’s past time to start digging, at least for some of us, and digging we have done – largely sponge pits for new and existing trees and shrubs, but we’ve also taken some time to start prepping the beds for this year’s crop. With luck and time, we’ll be adding new beds this year, and maybe even experimenting with some new varieties and soil mixtures.
As we approach the season, we thought we’d share a few resources that might be useful to our readers in getting (and keeping) the ball rolling:
- Home Vegetable Gardening in New Mexico – Circular 457 by George Dickerson, Extension Horticulture Specialist, NMSU College of Agriculture, Consumer and Environmental Sciences. This publication has good information on general New Mexico vegetable gardening topics as well as hints on planting, growing, watering, and harvesting.
- Growing Zones, Recommended Crop Varieties, and Planting and Harvesting Information for Home Vegetable Gardens in New Mexico – Circular 457-B. This has some good, detailed information on varieties and planting times for the three areas recognized by the Cooperative Extension Service. New Mexico Central headquarters, located in the dreaded Area 3, is faced with challenges associated with short growing seasons, and no doubt so are some of our readers. Others may be located in the slightly more forgiving Area 2.
- The Mother Earth News Vegetable Garden Planner – Walking past a magazine rack, we noticed a copy of Mother Earth News with the title “40 Tips To Maximize Garden Harvests” in big letters on the cover, as well as the moniker “Giant Gardening Issue!” Well, there was no way we were just walking past that. There’s some good information in there, including an announcement associated with their online garden planner. It’s free for 30 days, and $25 for a year or $40 for two years after the first 30 days. We haven’t done much with it yet, but it looks as if some of our readers may find it useful; it has tools for layout, plant spacing, and much more.
Happy tilling!
Edgewood Permaculture Gathering Teaches Harmonious Living And Land Management
by John Weckerle
Dr. Christian Meuli explains his rainwater catchment and cistern systems.
Saturday brought a unique event to Edgewood: the 15th annual Permaculture Gathering at La Resolana. Variously translated as “sun’s glare,” “sunspot,” “sun catcher,” and “sunny place,” La Resolana is a 15-acre parcel that is home to Edgewood’s Dr. Christian Meuli, physician and long-time permaculture expert. In addition to lecturing both locally and elsewhere for years, he has been putting permaculture to the test at La Resolana for more than three decades. With luck, we can hope he will still be doing so three decades hence.
Permaculture is a means of land management that incorporates and utilizes the natural characteristics of a given location, taking into account site hydrology, topography, soils, climate, regional ecology, and a myriad other factors that contribute to the “identity” of the place in question. From water harvesting to the understanding and development of living systems, the tenets and techniques that are essential to permaculture practice can be used for beautification, harmonious living, and even agricultural productivity.
The Permaculture Gathering was set to begin at noon, and by 12:03 many of us were already parking on the road on which Dr. Meuli’s residence is located. A short stroll down the driveway led to a large, metal barn, at the door of which visitors were offered a »» Edgewood Permaculture Gathering Teaches Harmonious Living And Land Management
Public Service Announcement: Free Annual Permaculture Gathering At La Resolana In Edgewood Next Saturday
by Christian Meuli
Saturday, October 2, 2010
12:00 PM Site Tour
2:00 PM Potluck
3:30 PM Bruce Noll — Keeping within the Poetry of Nature
This free permaculture gathering will include a site tour of rainwater cisterns, gravity as a resource, woodchip berms, swales, sponges, and tools I find useful.
La Resolana is the new name of this place in Edgewood. La Resolana is a place on the south side that harvests the sun and is shielded from the wind: a fertile place for dynamic sharing, creative thinking, and dialogue for what is possible.
Please bring interested friends and children, a favorite dish that you will enjoy sharing with others, and your finest sun hat! Please car pool and leave pets at home.
Bruce Noll will recite his favorite poets, including Walt Whitman, and his own wonderful nature poetry. He will share poetry that inspires insight within nature and within ourselves.
Take I-40 to Exit #187 in Edgewood (25 miles east of Albuquerque and 8 miles west of Moriarty). At the end of the off-ramp, go south two blocks to the stoplight at the intersection with Highway #333 (Smith’s Grocery will be on your left). Go straight up the hill on Edgewood Road #7 and turn right in ½ mile onto Moriarty Road (gravel). Go ¼ mile to #24 and turn right into my driveway or go straight ahead down the hill and park on your left.
I will have Brad Lancaster’s informative books on rainwater harvesting available for review and purchase (see his extensive website at www.harvestingrainwater.com/).
I look forward to seeing everyone and meeting new friends! If you need a map or a timely update, please call me at 281-4871.
Grow Your Own: What On Earth…
NOTE!!!!: The “sorta-recipe” in this article relies on a frying pan with an oven-safe handle. If you don’t have one, leave a comment and we’ll give you an entirely stove-top alternative.
by John Weckerle
…do we do with all this stuff?
Any of our readers who have had success in growing summer squash – including zucchini and the classic yellow squash – have probably found themselves with a superfluity, as it were, of would-be food. We say “would-be” of course, because it’s not food until you cook it up and eat it, although we do admit that small specimens make a nice raw snack, either in salads or cut into strips with a little ranch dressing. Or balsamic vinaigrette. Or pretty much anything into which one likes to dip one’s vegetables.
Even so, gardeners do occasionally run into surpluses that surpass their capacity for dipping. There is, of course, zucchini bread, and we can speak from experience on the subject of zucchini parmigiana. Anybody who can make eggplant parmigiana can do it with zucchini. We’ll cover that at another time, because if you’re a working person who needs something quick, parmigiana is probably not the thing – but if you want a recipe, let us know. In the meantime, let’s talk frittata.
Grow Your Own – Lurking Beneath The Foliage
by John Weckerle
Today's Harvest
Vegetable gardeners always wonder what’s going on while they’re on vacation. We had our good friend, Russ, watering while we were gone, and the beds came through with flying colors. Well, mostly one color – green – but we’re sure our readers get the picture. In fact, the foliage had developed to the point that several zucchini were hiding in Bed 3 well enough to grow to extra-large status (forearm length in two cases). Growing zucchini large is generally not recommended, as they taste better at about medium size. Bed 1 gave us another three green bell peppers this morning. Eggplants are still relatively small. There is also a mountain of kale and a good bit of chard in Bed 1, so we’ll definitely be eating our greens this week. Hmm… Zucchini, yellow squash, kale, bell peppers; some of this could be the beginning of another batch of wyngette soup.
As for Bed 2, tomatoes are still small and green, and it looks as if we’re losing one (but only one as far as we can see) to blossom end rot. We may yet get some out of the deal. Bed 2 is also home to the winter squash, and we can see an acorn squash and two spaghetti squashes hiding in there already. The parsley’s looking good, as are all the other herbs over in Bed 1.
Next year, we’re thinking of doing something different and creating Bed 4, which would be a more traditional double-dug raised bed. This would allow for a greater rooting depth for crops like tomatoes and eggplant.
Grow Your Own – Nothing Quiet On The Western Front
by John Weckerle
It’s been some time since we’ve posted anything on the topic of garnering one’s own food from a few small boxes west of the house, so this morning we have a few photos and some updates on the progress.
Bed 1 - Lettuce, kale, chard, green peppers, sage, oregano, and thyme
Grow Your Own – The Time Of The Season
by John Weckerle
Spring was a tough proposition here in Central New Mexico, with few good weekends for planting. Wind, cold, even snow in May made for difficult conditions for getting started. Last weekend was simply too windy for putting in new plants, but it was not too windy for a trip to Parker’s Farm Greenhouse in Edgewood (at the east end of Church Street), where we picked up some lettuce, straight neck yellow squash, zucchini, eggplants, green bell peppers, and various ornamentals (for the pots on the deck). These went in this week, along with the kale, chard, and three varieties of string beans we had already started. Still to be planted are tomatoes (Martian Giant), snow peas, and butternut squash. We think we’re giving the cruciferous (cabbage family) vegetables a break this year, based on previous years’ yields and some issues with aphids.
Bed 4 was, alas, not to be this year. Work pressures and other household efforts have taken up the time to prepare it, although there’s still a chance that we might pull something together in time for winter vegetables. We are considering a larger bed, combining aspects of our raised beds and traditional double-dug gardens, with the thought that some things – tomatoes, eggplants, and peppers, for example – might benefit from a greater rooting depth than our current strategy provides.
Grow Your Own: The Fantastic Four – Rise Of The Silver Sprout
by John Weckerle
Salad On The Hoof: Got Romaine? All you need is a pot, soil, water, some seeds, and a sunny window.
This past winter was a time for some, well, interesting discourse on global climate change. “Skeptics” local and nationwide heaped criticism on the concept, often using the winter weather as a springboard to dive into the muddy waters. Well, winter’s over, and it’s time to start growing – although we’ll have a brief mention of the previous season’s severity before we’re through.
Sprouts – though not those referenced in the title; again, that’s for later – are up! Tomatoes, kale, and chard were up three weeks ago. We started with tomatoes and green bell peppers to get a head start on our short season, and spinach, kale and chard because of their wonderful cold tolerance. In fact, we started spinach very early. Unfortunately, a mouse got in during some remodeling, and decided to dine on our spinach sprouts. Spinach seeds planted later have just poked up above the soil surface. »» Grow Your Own: The Fantastic Four – Rise Of The Silver Sprout
Grow Your Own – A Grower’s Work Is Never Done
by John Weckerle
Indoor Herbs
Even with daytime temperatures well into the forties recently at New Mexico Central headquarters, it’s still far too early for outdoor gardening. So what is a frustrated, would-be gardener to do?
Garden inside, of course.
Indoors is a great place for a miniature herb garden. I’ve found it easy to grow some of my most often-used herbs – for example, basil, dill, and cilantro, shown here – using a couple of plastic window boxes and some plain old Miracle Gro potting soil. The box in the foreground contains the “next generation” – seeds started yesterday to help provide a more-or-less continuous supply of fresh, flavorful herbs. A couple of “select-a-size” paper towels are serving as mulch to keep the soil from drying out while the seeds are germinating.
Not shown here are the spinach, kale, and romaine lettuce recently started at the other end of the room. Leafy green plants do just fine in the standard stuff – but fruiting plants like tomatoes may not produce well or may produce small fruit with this soil, as it is higher in nitrogen and lower in phosphorus than tomatoes and similar crops seem to like. Last year, we tried using unamended Hyponex potting soil for indoor tomato growing, but found that it hardened more than we liked if allowed to dry. This year, we may try a blend – Hyponex to tone down the fertilizer in the Miracle Gro, which will provide organic matter to keep the soil from hardening too much.
Grow Your Own – All Quiet On The Squirrel Front – Sort Of…
by John Weckerle
We have finally begun harvesting zucchini and yellow squash, and it looks as if it will be a bountiful summer at least as far as that goes. There are more that are within a day or two and, depending on how fast they grow, we may be looking at calabacitas, zucchini parmigiana, or both – or something else entirely. Several small eggplants are in the early stages of development, and small tomatoes are everywhere. The empty sections of Bed 1 have been replanted with lettuce, spinach, string beans, and green onions (all from seed) and chard seeds have been added to the existing sections to bring us a continuing yield. While it may seem a little late to be planting seed, remember that we experimented pretty successfully with covering Bed 1 last year (see article). »» Grow Your Own – All Quiet On The Squirrel Front – Sort Of…
Grow Your Own – The Good, The Bad, And The Squirrels
by John Weckerle
Having returned from our extended sojourn(s) in the eastern U.S., we are now in a position to update our readers on the progress of our gardening efforts and experiments. We wish to thank our good friends Russ and Phyllis Hayes, who diligently cared for the vegetables and all our other plants while we were on the road. Thanks to their efforts, we should be dining on fresh veggies (well, we’ve already had some kale and a few cherry tomatoes…) within the next week or so.
Bed 1