Most of our gardens are doing okay for the most part. Didn't plant beans this year, as will be finishing up a surplus this winter from two years ago. Will be planting them next year. Tomatoes have fruits, none ripe as of yet, but will have some. We don't have a greenhouse, so they are all outdoors. Am getting zucchini this year and the cukes have been slow and are just producing now. Last week we got down to 3 degrees overnight one night, the poor plants were so cold in the morning, but didn't freeze, thank goodness.
Peppercorn, I have 4 potato seed balls from Chieftain potato and will send them to you if you would like. I just don't have the time to experiment much as I would like to. I don't get up that way often and just can't see it in the near future, so the only way would be through mail.
Down to 4 degrees here a few nights back. I would love to have your seed balls. If you could mail them, that would be fine. I owe you.
Give a man a gun, and he can rob a bank. Give a man a bank, and he can rob the world.
Pics from a few weeks ago. Cold dry spring, followed by a week long heat wave, followed by cold and very soggy summer...
Outdoor cucumbers, tomatoes and peppers are yielding nothing. Squashes are enormous but a bit behind. Beans and peas are just catching up, weeks behind.
Other view.
One more...
Shows the deer-proofing / peas and beans trellis. Experimenting with zucchinis in pots. Plants grew WAY faster, but by mid-July, those outdoor outgrew the potted ones by a long shot and out-produce them as well. Advantage though is I can lift the pots and bring them indoor if there is a frost warning or hail storm coming.
Nice!
Give a man a gun, and he can rob a bank. Give a man a bank, and he can rob the world.
Thanks to Learner I now have a couple more potato seed types to experiment with in the future.
I may be going down to Calgary in a week or 3, so if anyone has seeds to share I would be happy to pick up along the way.
Give a man a gun, and he can rob a bank. Give a man a bank, and he can rob the world.
One more...
Shows the deer-proofing / peas and beans trellis. Experimenting with zucchinis in pots. Plants grew WAY faster, but by mid-July, those outdoor outgrew the potted ones by a long shot and out-produce them as well. Advantage though is I can lift the pots and bring them indoor if there is a frost warning or hail storm coming.
I also tried zucchinis in pots this year. All of them failed miserably. I only got one actual zucchini to form and it spoiled on the plant with blossom end rot.
One more...
Shows the deer-proofing / peas and beans trellis. Experimenting with zucchinis in pots. Plants grew WAY faster, but by mid-July, those outdoor outgrew the potted ones by a long shot and out-produce them as well. Advantage though is I can lift the pots and bring them indoor if there is a frost warning or hail storm coming.
I also tried zucchinis in pots this year. All of them failed miserably. I only got one actual zucchini to form and it spoiled on the plant with blossom end rot.
I find the yield is less and more care is required in the form of watering and fertilizing, but it’s a bit of an insurance against frost. They also started producing weeks ahead of the garden plant, so also a plus.
Trying to complete the “Holy Sh*t Winter is Already Here” great harvest of 2019 as snow flakes are gently flying.
Onions: all worked out pretty good. 2 kinds of white (Walla-Walla and Kelseys) and 1 kind of red. All hanging in the garage to dry.
Potatoes: Yukon Gold and Pink Fingerlings have worked out pretty good so far, especially the fingerling ones, happy with the harvest. My (name unknown) pink/white potatoes are very scabby and most of them ended up in the forest.
Apples: very abundant this year but of mediocre quality. Very thin and fragile skin, really easy to bruise. Made lots of apple sauve and jelly as well as dehydrated rings.
Zucchinis: really abundant, huge and good quality. More than I could eat/process/give away. I’ll try seed saving for the first time.
Cucumbers: my slicing ones (Thunder) grew extremely well in the greenhouse. Very abundant and i’ll Save the seeds. Pickling ones were a lost.
Tomatoes: complete write off, both indoor an outdoor.
Peas: worked out decently. Lots frozen for the winter. Lots still on the vines and getting ready to save for seeds.
Beans: late and small so I don’t have a great harvest. Drying what I have mostly as seeds for next year as I won’t have much to eat dried. Normal yellow and green “waxed” beans were just ok this year. Royale purples ones were amazing.
Beets and carrots are still mostly in the ground. We’ve had some fresh ones already and they were fine, nothing spectacular.
Trying to do this harvest while the wife still nurses a sciatica and my old helicopter pilot neck is acting up is not fun. #VoltarenRocks and #MicrowaveHeatPack
Our gardens did okay this year. Some plants did better than expected and even better than in previous years and others were okay. For some reason the last couple of years, it seemed that there wasn't going to be a tomato crop, then all of a sudden they were there and it was decent for our uses. Some changes are being planned for next years growing season which will certainly help in one of the garden areas. We are planning on changing the one area to boxes and possibly adding in a small greenhouse. Of course all in the planning stages, so we will see how it all works out.
