PNW: September 2013

Welcome to September all you SFG'ers! I had an unusually busy August and almost completely neglected my garden. Combine my neglect with no rain, and well, it isn't pretty. I finally spent an hour out there yesterday cleaning things up. I harvested a couple of mini pumpkins, two spaghetti squash, a watermelon, a few tomatoes, one and a half cucumbers (poor pollination), and the rest of the bush beans. Doesn't sound too bad, but it's basically all I got for the entire summer.

Powdery mildew did a number on all things squash, and the beans got rust. My broccoli was completely taken over by aphids and eaten up by cabbage worms. Carrots disappeared. I have a lot to learn!

Corn has filled out and the silks are drying up - I planted a popcorn variety so need to look up again and see how long to leave it on the stalks for drying. Need another hour to clear out the broccoli bed to and prepare it for garlic. Maybe I have time for some peas? I'll do some grocery store green onions and plant some radish seeds too this week. Oh, and Kale.

What is everyone else up to?

 HI GWEN  

we are busy cleaning up the garden between rain showers......we have severe late blight.....eek!....its been devastating watching our Tomato plants being taken over and gone with in a couple of days.... ....in the few years we have been gardening we have never seen it so bad.....anyone else dealing with it?

powder mildew is here and spreading.....not as fast as the blight but its on our squash, cucumbers and sugar snap peas......

with all of the yuck of the end of our summer gardening....

we are still hoping to enjoy:

harvesting the last of our tomatoes.....

hoping to get a few more cucumbers.....

we still have some peppers in a topsy turvy and pots to harvest.....

a lot of winter squash  we have picked four already and have at least 10+ Acorn, a couple of Butternut and one Delica (SP?) and 2 pumpkins......

beans giving us a second round ........

the last of our late corn is starting to plump up (hoping to fight off critters so we can eat some this year)......

kale going strong.......

fall carrots are coming in....

fall spinach is looking good......

2014 spring Walla Walla onion starts are up........

Fall cole crop hoop bed doing great.....cauliflower, broccoli, cabbage.....

leeks and green onions are beautiful......

so many Plums almost ready to harvest this year..... they are pulling down the branches with their weight  

we ate our first and only 3 peaches from our Daughters new peach tree and they were YUMMY!!

In the green house we are hoping our 4 little cantaloupes will mature more and ripen (their the size of a baseball right now LOL)....need to  harvest the rest of the Basil and peppers.....the sweet potatoes vines are still growing....not sure when to dig for potatoes.....??

when you write it all down........not too bad  of a gardening year  

Happy gardening and remember to save seeds!
Rose

I started kind of late with the idea of planting for the fall -- I only just read the old SFG book a month or so ago, and am not through the new one yet, so everything has been kind of a chaotic crash-course for me this summer.

I planted a few peas too early for a fall crop (only a single one germinated) and bookended that mistake, perhaps, by planting them too late for a fall crop; at least one of any size. I planted some a week and a half ago, some a week ago, and some just last night. Oh well, I'll see what happens. I hope they can take light frosts, or don't just shut down when the days get too short. We don't have very hard frosts here, and they usually melt away within an hour. Expected date of first frost is 10/21.

Picked some cherry tomatoes -- by far the best of the season. Also an early girl. Fondled three brandywines, which have been pink for a while and not ripening much.

Picked some Kentucky Wonder pole beans. Some other pole beans, look kind of like dragon tongue beans, have not been vigorous at all, but have finally put out a few tiny beans.

Checked lanterns on tomatillos. Some are finally filling out a bit, but most haven't. They seemed amazingly productive for much of the summer, with tons of flowers and lanterns, but many lanterns wound up with nada inside them, and then the flowering stopped.

Ate a lemon cucumber. I'll leave the two I'm growing in pots, but will uproot the others in the beds, which were big time failures. Consolation of a sort: the failures were mostly freebies given by a neighbor, whose cucumbers I tasted and found incredibly bitter. She doesn't mind that; she says, oh, just throw half of each cucumber away. But how do I know where the bitterness ends except by eating more extremely, face-clenchingly bitter cukes? I'd just as soon skip the ordeal.

Picked a few Better Bush tomatoes for dinner. I love how vigorous that plant is.

Got another load of horse poop from the neighbors. They have two horses who put out a big washtub full of poop per day. Really heavy and awkward to carry. I'm getting a nice big pile going. Think I'll rake up some leaves for more browns, and mix them in.

It's funny, the last week or two we've had lower temperatures, but the plants seem to be drying out more quickly. Maybe we've been having more wind?

Still haven't planted any fall crops besides peas, but will plant kale, more lettuce, radishes, and brussels sprouts.

A couple weeks ago I could tell that autumn was right around the corner: spiders started spinning webs like crazy, especially in the walkways of my gardens.  Every day I get a face full of cobwebs.  If I remember, I take a towel with me to swing around in front of me to clear a path, but I'm sure that I look like a crazy man doing so!  

My summer harvest is slowing down; I only have a couple meals of fresh corn left.    I would have met my goal for the amount of corn that I wanted to freeze, but I've been eating corn two meals a day for  3 weeks straight.  Guess I'll have to plant one more box next year.

Some of my fall cool crops are coming in.  It's nice to be eating broccoli and cauliflower again.

My BS are healthy and loaded with sprouts.  I'm anxious to try some, but Liz keeps saying 'not yet...not yet...not yet'.  


When I get all my winter squash harvested, I'm going to have to ask for help identifying some of them because they're sure not looking like what I planted!  Take these for example:


I have several plants putting these out, and they are from my own saved seeds.  They look like acorns, but I've never planted golden acorns before.  I wonder if they got crossed-pollinated last year?  I'm looking forward to trying them.  Last year my acorns were wonderfully sweet, creamy, and smooth-no butter or seasonings needed.  I sure hope these are as good 'cause I got a bunch!

Very cool looking squash, and I love those brussels sprouts!

FYI everyone, the Walmart in our area had 12x12" bag "pots", 11 inches high not including some sturdy carrying handles, for sale starting a month or so ago for $2.50 each, and now they're down to $2.00. In total I've got eight of them now. They're pretty sturdy. I've got peas happily sprouting in Mel's Mix in four of mine (I like peas and have pea-friendly neighbors). Too small for potatoes but nicely roomy otherwise.

They also had some nice hanging planters, long decorative black metal rectangles with coir in the bottom made to look like the usual sphagnum moss, for 7 bucks. I got one of those too, and filled it with spinach.

Also got a few of their 25-cent reusable fabric shopping bags. They leak water, so they're porous enough to use as grow bags. Dunno if you can still get the sale bags/planters in your areas, but the 25-cent bags are always there, as well as some 50-cent ones that are narrower and have better handles (but I don't care about handles and won't move the grow bags while they're being used).

wow....what a night storm show we had last night!.....the children and us thought it was beautiful  and....a little bit scary  it was amazing to watch all of the different colors in the sky......

we have had lightening and thunder storms before.....but this is the first time I have seen the lightning sending its bolt straight down instead of it going across the sky....and..... last night was the first time we have ever heard the crack of a bolt of lightning before the thunder sounded.....

went out a bit today to check on the gardens and it looks like they pulled thru just fine even with some hail beating down on them last night.....

how did everyone else hold up thru the storm?

also heard we are to get some high temps next week?.....exciting to hear and so glad we didn't pull up our zucchini plant yet....as we found a baby today.....and late planting of corn still has a chance......

happy gardening
rose....who is jealous of Boffers daily buffet of fresh corn

Marc thanks for letting us know about the walmart sale   hope to get over to one to check it out .....I love gardening sales!.....that's how we are able to get things for our gardens.... keep us posted on how your fall garden goes!

Boffer very cool looking squash......keep us posted on how they taste  its pretty cool you are starting to eat some cole crops already.....ours are still growing and looking pretty healthy  

happy gardening
rose

Took a friend to the grange, and, after having read about them and thinking "That sounds fantastic! And how cool looking!," I couldn't help but buy a six-plant flat of red brussels sprout seedlings. Until a few days ago, I had never even heard of red brussels sprouts. Of course, they're really supposed to be purple, like red cabbage.

I planted three in my neighbor's yard, and I think I will surround them with radishes. I kept three to plant at home. We have different sorts and infestation levels of pests between us, so I like the idea of not putting all our eggs in one basket.

Planted four spinach in the hanging basket I got from Walmart yesterday.

My mother asked me to come with her to Costco yesterday, so I did. It was clear and in the low to mid-80's outside, and uncomfortably warm inside Costco. I was happy to step into the cold fresh veggies room and didn't want to leave. Whebn we were done shopping, we left the store under a sky full of darkening, swift-moving clouds.

The freeway onramp was a mile or so away, and halfway there rain started coming down. I was talking gardening with my mother, and said that a friend who gardens had pulled up all his tomatoes and planted fall crops. Not me, I said. I'm hanging on to my tomatoes to the bitter, bitter end. I don't want to lose a single one!

Then, a moment after we got on the freeway, hail started coming down heavy as machine gun fire. The freeway was inches deep in water in minutes. Remember that time, I asked her, when I told you that I wouldn't pull up my tomatoes and was hanging onto them until the bitter end? I think this was it.

As soon as I helped her unpack her loads of Costco goodies, I raced down to my garden and checked my plants, expecting them to be smashed down and full of holes.

Only one tomato plant had been hurt, with only one branch halfway broken off. Everything else was fine. It looks like we escaped the hail, or most of it, and just had a nice long rain.

Don't you love happy endings?

Here are pictures of my harvest this year. (I finally figured out how to get pictures on here) 









And my pickles (cucumbers were bought at our local farmers market)  

Tanarose.....what a great looking harvest!!....congrats!

what kind of tomato are those  yellow ones?....they look similar to a Jubilee....and what are your plans on storing your great harvest of onions?  
 
Marc....yes.... I love happy endings....so glad your plants made it thru that storm!!

happy gardening
Rose....who is sooo sad  that she has lost the rest of her tomato plants to late blight!....looking at how fast it spread thru the gardens....we are still in shock!....wondering if its because of our next door neighbor planting late potatoes ( late as in we already had pulled out all of our potatoes)....in her front yard under straw.... they too look like they have severe blight ??

Supposedly you're not supposed to plant store-bought taters, right?

What a shame, to lose wonderful and comparatively expensive tomatoes because of plain old cheap lowly potatoes.

Marc...... Im not sure if our neighbor used store bought taters or seed potatoes.....Im just thinking her late planting might have brought the late blight that we have never had before....she just moved in next door a few months ago....the neighbor before her never had a veggie garden that I know of.....our new neighbor who by the way is very sweet is using the straw method of gardening....and has planted lots of things in her front yard including the late planting of potatoes.....

the more we started to think about it.... our neighbor behind us has a garden in for the first time too....hubby peeked over the fence and he said her tomato plants look worse then ours.....and ours are dead with black stems, leaves and dark ruff spots on the skin of fruit....they look bruised......so not sure how it could look worse.........I know that the neighbor behind us used store bought tomato plants that could have brought the blight as well...... 

I will try and take a pic tomorrow before we pull up the last of our plants......I will put up the last pics when they were healthy and then the blight one....its crazy...by the time we noticed, they were gone the next day.....

now IM not sure what we are going to plant next year....as I thought we had figure it all out until this happened.....ugg....been looking into blight resistant tomatoes...even then from what I have read....they still can get it....

happy gardening
rose.....who needs to snap out of it and carry on!.....on a bright note....we finally were able to eat ONE ear of corn that the critters missed in the back garden.....out of 2 beds.....4x8 and 4x10......ONE ear .....ONE yummy ear that was split 4 ways eaten fresh in the garden......

wondering how our PNW friends are doing?

what you all are up to  I miss hearing from you!!

our familygardens had a good warm week.....its allowed our squash to keep going....they were hit with powdery mildew, but the new growth is free from it....we didn't do anything to treat...just let them be and so far we have several new baby zuk's and crooknecks  the acorns are continuing to fill out and are the biggest acorns we have ever had .....so sweet and yummy!

Beans keep on giving....a bumper crop I suppose..... that we are giving lots away  lost count of how much we canned....after 50 pints.... plus have frozen 4 gal bags worth....and they keep coming LOL.....would you all think I was unthankful and a bad gardener if I were  wishing they would stop

onions starts have gotten a second hair cut .....for the most part they are not in beds but are scatter thru out our garden area's....like with our Rose bushes and such and in containers/pots.....

fall spinach is almost big enough to eat.....seeded some more as germination was poor......seen a few lettuce sprouts but then they were gone....critters!...we sowed a few more.....

fall cole crops doing well....no harvesting yet

been cleaning out beds getting them ready to add more height to them along with a heavy dose of compost.....going to purchase some local mushroom compost to mix with our home grown compost that is looking pretty good!.....going to put all but the cole crop hoop beds to sleep for the winter.....

the rest of our fall/winter growing is going to be in containers and pots and a few things in the green house.....

moved pepper plants into the green house hoping to get a few more  

waiting to harvest our little melons that are in the green house

we ate 5 more little corn cobs and one very nice size one untouched by the critters  trying to find the joy among the lost of so much in those corn beds....next year hubby is going to put up some kind of electric fence around the corn.... .....the corn has been his pride and joy and the one veggie he looks forward to the most in gardening......

still lots to do to get ready for fall and winter

what are you doing now in your gardens?

happy gardening
rose.....who is happy harvesting lots of plums!

Hi everyone! Fall has brought on the busy season of school and church and the carefree summer days are gone. I have a new kindergartner this year, and feel like a slave to that half day and the bus schedule - homeschooling just keeps getting more and more attractive! My middle school child auditioned for and made the Jazz Band this year, so we're adding our first extra-curricular school activities to the calendar also.

I can't believe how ridiculously hot it's been this week! I was *thisclose* to bringing an umbrella to the bus stop so I could wait in the shade. (Knowing I'll need an umbrella for about 90% of the school year, I opted for the shade of my own trees across the street from the bus stop instead). My youngest has finally mastered pedaling a tricycle and insists on daily trips to the road construction several blocks away to watch the tractors. I got sunburned. Ugh! Unlike Rose, my squash didn't survive the powdery mildew long enough to put on new growth with the return of the sun, except for that one zucchini that hasn't produced a baby yet. Maybe it still has a chance, but I've noticed all the baby cucumbers aren't getting pollinated anymore so I guess bee activity has slowed way down.

A raccoon didn't get my corn, but some type of little black bugs did. I suppose they may be some type of aphids? I haven't shucked one of the infested ears to see if they are inside, but they are swarmed only over the ears and nowhere else on the plant.

I'm trying to decide if I should try to eat the mini pumpkins I grew or save them for decoration. The others that grew didn't get full size. Still need to do that refrigerator banana pepper recipe before my peppers go bad. Oh - I didn't care for the dragon tongue bush beans so if anyone would like the other half of my package send me a PM with your address - there's just over 2 dozen left, from Seed Savers Exchange.

Now - back to my chores! Happy gardening y'all.

gwen.....shuck that corn  we had the same thing last year and the black aphids were only on the outside  

congrats on your little ones peddeling  

happy gardening
rose

I've been feeling out of sorts in the garden lately, during the transition to fall/winter weather.  I'm still harvesting some summer plantings of  tomatoes, cukes, yellow squash, beans, beans, beans, and more beans.  My earliest fall broccoli, cauliflower, chard, and bok choi are ready to be harvested.  And we couldn't  resist trying our first winter squashes of the season.  At the same time, I'm prepping a few boxes so they'll be ready for my earliest 'spring' plantings in  late January, getting compost sifted and stored for next year, and getting some MM made up and stored for next year.  After spending at least a little time in the garden every day for most of the year, it's odd not to be out there every day now.

ROSE, I'm feeling the same way about beans right now!  I've way exceeded my objective for the year, and they keep on coming on.  Good thing the canned beans will keep for several years, 'cause I've got a good head start on next year's stash!  Give your hubby my condolences for his corn losses.  It's my favorite garden veggie too, and it kills me when we have  lousy summer weather, and the corn harvest is poor.  It must have been extra difficult to be so close to a good harvest, and see it disappear overnight.

I've got a surplus of winter squashes this year so I harvested some to sell at the farmers'  market.  Just my luck, there's a glut of squashes for sale right now, and prices are the lowest I've ever seen them.    I'd make a lousy commercial grower!

My BS are healthy, relatively bug free, and loaded with little sprouts, but I'll be surprised if the sprouts get big enough to be worthwhile.

I had a big surplus of hot peppers in my greenhouse, and sent most of them to the farmers' market too.  I use so few, I don't know why I bother to grow them.  I forget how old I was when I realized that my output of them burned more than their input!  My focus next year will be on bell peppers.  Even in my greenhouse, the bells don't get as big or prolific as I understand that they can be.  I'm going to try heated soil, and do the greenhouse within a greenhouse thing.  Maybe the extra heat, particularly at night, will do the trick.

Gwen, why not use your mini-pumpkins for decorations, and then eat them.  They should keep for months.

Marc Iverson wrote:...plain old cheap lowly potatoes.

Thems fightin' words!    (Watch out, there are a few potato heads on the forum!)

The difference in flavor between store bought and home grown potatoes can be as dramatic as the difference between store bought and home grown tomatoes.  Plus, they're very   nutritious, easy to grow, and easy to store.

Boffer which farmers market did you send things to?..... we haven't been to our local farmers market this year...maybe worth a trip tomorrow  not that I want to do any more canning, but it sure would be nice to get some other veggies besides beans on the shelf for winter  

we gave some plums and beans to our new neighbor next door and she gave us some purple potatoes....boy were they good.....it was a hoot to have French fried purple potatoes for dinner...the kids loved it!.....we want to grow some of those next year.....its pretty cool....our new neighbor is using the Ruth Stout no digging method....she just lay her seed potatoes on top of the grass and put hay over them...kept them watered added hay when needed..... and she said she has harvested over 50 pounds worth  and there is still more to harvest......

its funny the two cheapest veggies you can purchase is corn and potatoes....both are our most favorite to grow in our gardens.....if we could only grow two veggies those would be the two  

thanks for the condolences Boffer for our corn lost.....hubby and son were out there tonight with his pellet gun   trying to get the rats ....he said when he came in that the rats were taunting them  last night he thought he got one and it turned out to be one of the pinwheels that we left in with the beans to keep the birds away

happy gardening
rose

Marc Iverson wrote:Supposedly you're not supposed to plant store-bought taters, right?

What a shame, to lose wonderful and comparatively expensive tomatoes because of plain old cheap lowly potatoes.

PotatoHead chiming in - personally, if it comes down to the choice, I will ALWAYS take my taters over my maters!  I love growing both, but my first love is spuds.  And I have planted lots of store-bought taters and have never had a problem with them or with them infecting my other nightshade crops with anything. 

GG

GG, I'm glad you responded. I want to try potato wedges in container. All I need to know is WHEN to start them! I've asked twice on this forum with no response. Zone 9-ish

sandersan here in our area we usually plant potatoes in early spring and harvest in july-aug.....

our new neighbor planted her spuds later then that and is just now harvesting them.....so for next year we are thinking about trying a late planting of spuds as well to see if we can get more......we love our taters!

we are going to see if we can even grow some in a container to harvest this winter.....

what is your weather like?......do you get frost?

happy gardening
rose

I just returned from an eight-day vacation and found HUGE beans and some corn.

The salad greens are still edible, and the strawberries are blooming (and eagerly pollinated by my honeybees).  Cukes and more Zukes are trying to make it before the first frost, as are the tomatoes and corn.

The vacation was quite productive, in that I gathered seaweed and old pine needle compost.  Unfortunately, my friend's daughter found the oak leaf mold he'd saved for me and dumped it into her own garden.

Also, I made it a point to visit Concentrates, Inc. in Milwaukee, OR and got a couple of bags of fish compost (yard waste, hardwood chips, and fish).  It appears to be well-composted.

I did visit a winery, in hopes of obtaining some grape pommace, but a heavy rain last week delayed the harvest.

sounds like you had a very productive vacation donna  

we need to start thinking about finding different ingredients for our compost too....we have wanted to collect seed weed and need to get to it  also we have a horse ranch down the road......

thanks for the update as it reminded me of things we need to get done  

happy gardening
rose

FG, We do get frost; I think the first frost is around Nov 15th. Can the green tops survive frost? Dang, I really want to try some. I will wait until March if that is what it takes.

sanderson wrote:GG,  I'm glad you responded.  I want to try potato wedges in container.  All I need to know is WHEN to start them!   I've asked twice on this forum with no response.  Zone 9-ish

I don't know the optimal time to plant in your region, but you could probably plant anytime.   Planted seed potatoes will survive any freezes we get here.  The plants will survive frosts.  A good freeze may damage some greenery, but they usually will come back.  

I always plant a few potatoes in Oct when I plant my garlic.  They start making an appearance in late Feb/early Mar,   before I do my main planting.  They may 'wake-up' even sooner in your climate.

FamilyGardening wrote:Boffer which farmers market did you send things to?....

Little ol' Yelm's farmers' market is in its second year!   It's not very big yet, but it's growing.

This year, I mulched some of my potatoes with wood chips, and they did fine.  But I also tried black plastic, and I like it better: less work for a lazy gardener!  I layed down plastic, cut an 'X' to plant the potato.  Done.  I got a few green potatoes, but not a big deal.  Easy peasy potatoes!