A Morning Tidying Up The Garden

 Today I had PT at 1 p.m. It's usually at 10 or 11 a.m. We were having leftovers for dinner so I was thinking I could fix breakfast and then sit and stitch til I had to leave for therapy. About 7:30 a.m. Vince said he would come out and help me in the garden. Oh, yes! I'll give up stitching for his help in the garden any day.

I had just started jarring up the tomato powder from the freeze dryer so I finished that. I got 7 pints and a bit more than half of a half pint of powder.

I've documented how many jars of tomato powder I have. I have given Chad two quarts and will give him more if he needs it but I'm hoping I have enough freeze dried that I can plant only enough tomatoes next year for us to eat in salads and on sandwiches and not have to can or freeze dry more tomatoes. I will have to plant more Sweet 100 tomatoes for the dogs. I doubt I have enough of those freeze dried to get them through the winter since tomatoes seem to be their favorite snacks. I do limit how many they get but even with that, we will probably run out.

A couple of days ago, Vince pulled all the okra out but I wanted to add some bone meal, peat moss, mushroom compost and maybe a bit more garden soil to those raised beds where I'm wanting to plant the garlic. He did all that and while I was away at PT, he started building the bed for the blackberry starts we need to get planted.

Since we had a hard freeze and the tops were dying, I went ahead and pulled out the turmeric. There's 8 pounds there! I doubt I'll have to plant turmeric next year either.

Then I pulled out all the ginger. I had planted two tubs of ginger. Both were "constructed" the exact same way but one of the didn't drain at all and by the time I realized it, all the ginger had rotted so I only got half as much ginger as I had hoped to get. Vince is going to dump the bad tub and see if he can figure out what's wrong with it. I'm guessing the dirt that was put in first is more clay than good soil and it just sat there and didn't let water drain through but Vince will fix it so I doesn't happen again next year. I had bought fresh ginger from Azure Standard and that's what I used to plant and I was very happy with it.

Look how beautiful that ginger is! Of all the things I grow (and I don't grow that many things!), fresh ginger is probably the one that is most different from "fresh" storebought ginger.

That's all we harvested but while I was out, I took some photos of the lettuce and other greens growing  ..  because they make me so happy!

That's the merlot lettuce. That makes a salad so pretty!

The Little Gem lettuce is starting to look like it's supposed to look - like a mini version of Romaine. It will soon be large enough that we can make little bite sized wraps with chicken or tuna salad.

This is the Purple Lady Bok Choy. It's kind of a toss up whether I like this better or the Tatsoi but I munch on those two all day!

That's the Tatsoi. Obviously I had covered the bok choy and Tatsoi with straw and then put a sheet over them before we had a freeze. Sunday night it's probably going to be about 20 degrees here. Not sure I can protect them from that but I'll do my best.

Summers seem never-ending here and we get such a short amount of time between 90 degree days and 10 degree nights. I would be happy if summers ended in early August and we could grow cooler weather crops and not have hard freezes til mid to late November. Not living in the right place for that, am I?

There's cilantro. It's kinda one of those plant it once and you'll have it forever plants. It should be good to 10 degrees but there are probably enough seeds left from the summer crop that it will come back again as soon as the weather gets warmer.

This lettuce is pretty but it's so, so fragile. If I pick it, take it inside and wash it, by the time it gets to our plates, it's looking like it's been crushed and abused. I can't remember the name but it's on the tag in the container. I won't grow it again. There are too many more hardy varieties of lettuce. 

Last but not least - the star of the garden as far as I'm concerned:

Raspberries! We planted two raspberry plants last year. I can't remember what one was called but it started producing in the spring and produced quite a few raspberries. They didn't have the best flavor - good but not great. The second one - the tag said "Flowering Raspberry". It didn't grow nearly as much as the other one did. The first one has shot up about 8 new plants. This one sat there til about July and then it started producing raspberries. They are the best tasting raspberries.. So much flavor. It has slowed down and every day there are three or four ripe raspberries on it. This morning Vince walked by it and said "There's a ripe raspberry!" He picked it and ate it. What he doesn't know is that his greedy wife goes out every morning with the dogs and picks everything that's ripe and eats it right there on the spot!

We've planted probably 8 more raspberry plants and I'm hoping they taste as good as this one does.