PNW First of April updates

Lavender Debs wrote:snip...Their usual practice is to get the best price for the best product from a single producer.

Yeah, and then if it sells well, buy them out and re-brand it as a Kirkland Signature product. I've always liked Costco too, but I'm starting to get a little annoyed with that. My pantry looks like something out of a cartoon, only everything is labeled Kirkland Signature instead of ACME.

Well I came here to do a webchat with my mother-in-law, but we miscommunicated on the time so now I'm free to get to that Mel's Mix. See y'all!

wow....what a nice day we had here in our area of the PNW

we harvested our first bok choi this spring from our new raised bed and had it for dinner :drunken:



the broc's, cauli's and cabbage are all doing well



we up potted more tomatoes and put some of the bigger ones out in the green house



a few younger tomatoes we up potted and put into the smaller green house along with some of my other baby seedlings....



the peppers are doing very well....we have five of these guys growing under lights



the sugar snap peas in our SFG have reach the trellis



fava beans in our SFG are getting very thick and green



soon we shall be having our first spring salad from our SFG



we found a few more potatoes popping up no sign yet of the asparagus :scratch: we are still in hopes.....

oh brossel sprouts



and kolurabi (sp?) doing good if you look up to the square above these four you can seen baby seedlings coming in that we direct planted and they are going to be purple



hugs

rose who hopes you all had a wonderful warm day out in the dirt!

dan your sprouts look great!

what all do you have planted in there?

those flowers you posted are sooo pretty!!....i bet they smelled good too

thanks for sharing your garden and pic's of your adventure

hugs

rose

@gwennifer

I looked it up and those Blue Mystique orchids I saw are dyed!

How Blue Mystique Orchids are Made

Never occurred to me that some one would actually dye a living potted flower an unnatural color like that and charge a premium price for it....live and learn.

I can bum rides from my friends from time to time....I managed to fanangle a one of my friends into giving my a ride yesterday..they were also shopping around for garden supplies.

I probably don't have room for a tree like that....then again I am the guy who entered a giant pumpkin growing contest on a whim just because the seeds were free....I still don't know if I can find room to actually go one of those.

Its probably a good thing those trees were so expensive.....I can get carried away some times.

I actually picked up a One Green World catalog at Earthday at the Oregon Garden....they have a display garden there and a couple of guys from were on hand to answer questions...what a great resource!

http://www.onegreenworld.com/

They have all sorts of cool stuff....columnar apples, sea berries, cider pears,paw paw trees, tea plants (did not know you could grow tea in the PNW), an a hundred other varieties of berries and fruit trees from around the world.

@Family Gardening

I have Watermelon Radish, Purple Dragon Carrot, Chioggia Beets, Green Arrow Peas, Yukon Gold Potatoes, Shallots, and Iceberg Lettuce planted....and those flowers all did smell heavenly.

It felt like summer today

I got some photos from trip to the Oregon Garden to share with you guys....unfortunately not much was in bloom but I did manage snap a few nice photos anyway.

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The Gift Shop was nice too.

They had both the ANSFG book and the ANSFG Cookbook.

But I picked up a Japanese style Hori Hori Knife they had there...because sometimes potting flowers and such can feel a bit unmanly....but using a knife that is one part trowel and one part combat knife looking thingy to work the garden with makes up for that.

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And I picked up some of they Monastery Mustard they had on sale.

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Its made by Benedictine Sisters from the nearby Monastery in Mount Angel. Great Stuff.

The Earth Day freebies there were not bad either....I walked away with a small bag of free compost.

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Always nice to be able to handle a compost and try it out before you commit to buying a whole cubic yard of the stuff.

And I even learned about an entirely new source of and type of compost I wasn't even aware existed....mealworm castings

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mealworm castings?.....thats interesting....havent heard of those before....i know what mealsorms are just havent heard of their castings being used in gardening before.....

dan is that what was in your free compost?

hugs

rose......who can not believe her eyes .....we have sunshine again today :drunken:

Yes it has been really nice lately hasn't?

Wow!



I sadly did not receive the mealworm castings as my free compost....what I got was ordinary generic stuff made from veggies scraps and stuff. Would have been cool if I did though.

I am new to sfg and I feel like a little kid because a week in a half ago I planted one 4x4 and got sprouts this weekend so excited. The weather was beautiful this weekend. I planted my tomatoes and I am not sure what happened but they look fried and I do not know what to do or if they will make it. Any advise would be helpful I started them as seeds in the house and had lots of plants and 3 of the look okay but not the others. I enjoy the comments and info here.

Dreamcatcher: the reaction of your sprouting tomatoes may be relevant to several things: adequate water, soil mix into which they were planted, weather. It's hard to hone in on a cause for less-than-perfect results in planting. For instance here, out of five varieties of tomatoes planted as seed, four have given me sprouts, the fifth just appears to be sulking. This in a greenhouse, even. However, tomatoes really, really like warmth at their roots, and my seedling heat mat fell victim to a poker game. Long story, short version, kids nailed it to a table to make their poker game table. It's discouraging, but think this way: great way to learn to do better. And it's a life-long quest for success, just like every other worthwhile venture. Hang in there, kid, and remember: in this gardening game, you can eat your mistakes....usually.

dreamcatchersw1032 wrote:... I planted my tomatoes and I am not sure what happened but they look fried and I do not know what to do or if they will make it. Any advise would be helpful I started them as seeds in the house and had lots of plants and 3 of the look okay but not the others. I enjoy the comments and info here.

Hi dreamcatcher! Welcome to the forum! Did you harden off your tomatoes before planting them in your garden?

gwennifer wrote:

dreamcatchersw1032 wrote:... I planted my tomatoes and I am not sure what happened but they look fried and I do not know what to do or if they will make it. Any advise would be helpful I started them as seeds in the house and had lots of plants and 3 of the look okay but not the others. I enjoy the comments and info here.

Hi dreamcatcher! Welcome to the forum! Did you harden off your tomatoes before planting them in your garden?

I do not know what harden off is so the answer to your question is no. Is there some special formula to putting them outside.

dreamcatchersw1032 wrote:

gwennifer wrote:

dreamcatchersw1032 wrote:... I planted my tomatoes and I am not sure what happened but they look fried and I do not know what to do or if they will make it. Any advise would be helpful I started them as seeds in the house and had lots of plants and 3 of the look okay but not the others. I enjoy the comments and info here.

Hi dreamcatcher! Welcome to the forum! Did you harden off your tomatoes before planting them in your garden?

I do not know what harden off is so the answer to your question is no. Is there some special formula to putting them outside.

Yes. See the link below for details....

http://www.garden.org/foodguide/browse/veggie/tomatoes_getting_started/357

Since I have been away for several days, I have a lot of catching up to do.

Welcome dreamcatchersw and we are looking forward to hearing how your SFG progresses. I am sorry about your poor tomato transplants, especially when you grew them from seed. I think Daniel gave you some good advice, with his link to hardening off your transplants.

Rose, your bok choi, snap peas and everything else looks so great. You go girl!

Daniel, I enjoyed your tour of Oregon Gardens, have not been there for several years. It was fairly new then and rather sparse. I'll bet it is filling in beautifully. I enjoyed seeing your seedlings thru the hardware cloth. I am so glad you got the hari kari ( ) knife to use in your garden.

Debs, as always, your gardens look great. Too bad Bomber is determined to grow his own bones in your garden.

These (artichokes) have been in an unheated green closet (with a ripped zipper). Think they need heat? Time? Some kind of plant food?"

I really think time and warmth are going to send those artichokes into a big growth spurt. When I started them from seed last year, it took forever for them to grow from just the first two leaves. Even the first true leaves were very small for quite a while. The worst problems I had with the artichokes is aphids and snails/slugs. Here on the coast it does not get as cold over the winter as most of you experience and my artichokes have come back for the fourth year with no protection at all. Mulch, such as straw can make the difference during the winter for cooler areas.

We have actually had two nice weekends in a row. Last weekend planted the Kohlrabi, Cauliflower, Broccoli (Calabrese and Veronica) as well as the Walla Walla onions and Nantes carrots. My Sugar Snaps from March never sprouted, so, replanted with Mammoth Melting Snow Peas and Sugar Snap peas last weekend and several have germinated in this gorgeous weather. One 4X4 is done except for a tulle cover to keep the cabbage worms and aphids out.

Yesterday it hit 70 and I got a slight sunburn working on my new two barrel spinning composter. My Mother's Day gift arrived early. Today has been sunny and warm and I'm loving it. Needed 10 ft pvc pipes for more hoops and the clamps to hold them onto the table tops. The existing hoops are too far apart to really support a plastic cover without sagging so each bed will get one more hoop.

Friday night we had our first spring salad with Parris Island Cos Romaine and Drunken Frizzy Headed Woman lettuces from the front porch "Round Foot Garden". Add a few store bought grape tomatoes, some Feta cheese and a balsamic viniagrette then enjoy. Enough larger leaves left for dinner tomorrow night too. Love the cut and come again harvest method.

Thanks for the great update furbalsmom!

Rose, I hope my bok choi looks as great as yours!!

Daniel, thanks for sharing all your pictures. I bought one of those garden knives too! Actually, I bought three and gifted the others to my mom and MIL for Mother's Day last year. Mine came in really handy for planting bulbs in my front garden bed last fall, which is full of roots from mature trees and shrubs. My mom found hers really handy for lifting and dividing perennials.

Furbalsmom, I have a friend who went to the Oregon Garden when it first opened, and they told me it would be worth a visit in about ten years. Looks like they had their grand opening in 2001, so maybe it's time to check it out. I'm coveting your dinner salad. I looked really close and have baby sproutlings of Salad Bowl and Red Sails today. Hope that means the other four lettuce varieties will be making an appearance soon, and that the third time will be the charm with getting my spinach squares filled in.

Rose, I'm encouraged to see that my peppers look like yours! They are a neat looking plant and I'm enjoying them so far. My peas have not reached my trellis yet, but the bottom rung is kinda high. The good news is, those peas I experimented with sprouting indoors and popping straight outside have taken off and are growing. So all my holes are filled in and I officially have 32 pea plants growing out there.

Bad news, I spied a very sad broccoli plant yesterday and went out to investigate. It's square was teeming with itty bitty ants. What's up with that? How did they hurt the broccoli plant?

All my taters have sprouted. And my tomatoes are too big for my windowsill now and are trying a taste of the outdoors today. But the determinate Roma's have flower buds. What's up with that? I thought determinates set fruit all at once? I was expecting the plant to get much bigger before it started setting buds.

I know determinates are supposed to produce all at once, but a I find that to be only partially true. The majority of the tomatos are produced during a short time, but I've had determinates put out suckers and a later smaller crop.

Kay

Being a bit of a cheapskate, and having lusted after the 'hari kari' gardening knife, I bought some cheap heavy duty steak knives at Grocery Outlet, and they've become my favorite weeding tool. Turned around and spent all I had saved on more and different tomato seeds.

It's official, my broccoli plant is a goner. I can see that the ants have chewed away its stem. I didn't know ants did that.

Oh, man, Gwennifer, that is so too bad. Know where you can rent an aardvark? Sorry 'bout that. Would some boric acid help with the ant problem? And did you look out to see Mt. St. Helens has sent up a steam plum this afternoon?

I love the nickname you all have for the hori hori knife....hari kari garden knife....

Sorry Daniel, I just couldn't help myself when you described that manly hori hori knife.

Gwennifer, I am so sorry about your broccoli. I have only had to deal with ants in the garden once, when they were herding aphids on my artichoke. I was able to wash the ants and aphids off the leaves with a strong jet spray of water from the hose. I know that won't work on the stems, especially if they were inside.

Nonna wrote:And did you look out to see Mt. St. Helens has sent up a steam plum this afternoon?

Since I am a couple of hundred miles south and west, I did not hear about that. uggg

gwen.....sorry to hear the ants ate your boc i didnt know they would do that...

nonna....we thought the purple sky tonight was amazing.....i think we are to far from Mt. St. Helens for the sky to be from that though.....but...who knows....it sure was pretty.....

we had another sunny day today....we got some things done....

the kids cleaned out their self watering containers added some compost then planted some carrot seeds and transplanted some green onions we had growing in the small green house....my son put some sugar snap peas in his....now we wait for the weather to warm up enough to plant their tomatoes the kids cantainers are self watering and filled with MM

my son's



my daughters



yesterday i was able to plant our celery seedlings.....couldnt remember how many to a square so i went ahead and put four in....we can always move them later i was being lazy yesterday .....i up potted my leeks and some more basil.....hard work that is .....the basil smells amazing already....i almost ate some of the babies.....

here is the celery



here is mr. collard green who is bolting hubby is very sad....



we did notice though...there seems to be a baby collard green jr. growing right under him :scratch:



hugs

rose

I'm still waiting for the weather to warm up just a bit at night to get my tomatoes planted under cloches.

Regarding the celery... let us know if that four to a square works. I will be planting two per square.

So excited saw that my cucumber, onion, corn, pumpkin, beans and second batch of peas have all sprouted. Thank you all for your information and help and welcoming me.