Mom Always Said "A Watched Pot Never Boils"

Sometimes daily, sometimes every second or third day, you will find me out in the garden, camera strapped around my neck, looking for blossoms, bugs, and produce. So far, the sun sugar tomato plants have produced one very small round of tomatoes (but O. M. G. when they produce the next round, it will be an explosion of fruit); the zucchini have been giving nonstop now for over a week. In fact, today I harvested 9 more zucchini, many of which are destined for a zucchini chocolate sheet cake. The picture shows one of my cats, Dakota, checking out the zucchini to see if it is kitty-worthy. (Yes, Dad, I will wash off the kitty hair before cooking with it.)

But I am ever-so-anxious for the rest of the garden to bring on the food! My beans are blossoming and vining and just beginning to produce some beans (as evidenced by the picture), but they have a lot more work to do! Plus, while I love zucchini and have lots of recipes to fix it many different ways, it would be nice to have some variety in my garden diet...some rich, juicy tomatoes, a crisp cucumber, a little cilantro to spice up a salad or some salsa.

But despite my whining, the plants are doing very well. The cucumbers look absolutely amazing. I do wonder, however, WTH I was thinking when I planted the dill in the very next row. I am going to have to put some fencing or something between the cukes and dill or move the dill so it won't be literally overshadowed (and killed) by the cukes. Only about three dill plants took hold, so I'd really like to keep them growing!

The beans are vining and blossoming nicely, including the ones that I planted too close to the zucchini. The onions and shallots look pretty good, too, although only a few shallots actually came up. I'll probably end up simply using those for seed shallots next year. But the onion greenery is fantastic, and I can see a thickening of the stalk at the bottom, which hints to me of a decent size bulb growing.

I didn't think much about companion planting this year, so eager was I to get the plants into the ground. Apparently, beans and onions do not companion well. I'm not certain what this will mean for bean production or flavor...I'll have to do a bit more research. But even though I haven't gotten much produce out of my garden yet, I have high hopes that I will soon be eating more of a variety of food from my garden. And I suspect that once the tomato fruit begins to ripen--there is already a LOT of fruit on each plant--I will be complaining that I can't keep up with the variety.

First Harvest of the Season

After hubby and I returned home from seeing Topol in Fiddler on the Roof in Chicago, I toured the garden to see how my plants were doing. I was ecstatic to see that six Sun Sugar tomatoes were ripe and ready to pick! After taking a picture, David and I promptly ate them. Tomatoes don't last long around here, especially the Sun Sugar ones. They are naturally sweet and also great salad tomatoes.

I staked the rest of the heirloom tomato plants now that they were all standing tall and straight (and yes, Michelle, even the tiny ones are doing well)! I'm happy to say I haven't lost a single tomato plant so far.

I am also happy to see that the Beefsteak tomato plants are preparing to fruit--they have blossoms galore! For example, on this one plant, in just this one cluster, I have seven blossoms open and four more preparing to open! All of the original hort sale tomato plants have blossoms, so it won't be long before I will be able to report many more tomatoes.

The zucchini are doing very well also. The plants are huge and green with very large leaves (the stakes you see between the rows are bean plants. Maybe not the best planting idea, but we'll see how it goes). I didn't lose any of these plants, either, and I'm beginning to feel the first tremors of fear that I may be overrun with more zucchini than I can cook, freeze, and give away. I decided to take a peek inside one of the plants to see what the blossom status is. OMG. The core of the plant is nothing BUT blossoms! And this is only the beginning, and only one plant. So prepare yourselves, dear readers, to receive zucchini in the near future.



I also got down on hands and knees--not an easy task, mind you--and weeded the beans and onions. With all the rain we've had, I had a lot of weeds encroaching that needed to be pulled. Luckily many of them came up easily by the roots. Tomorrow I will dig newspaper out of our recycle bin and shred it and mulch between the rows to keep the weeds down. So far, the grass clippings around each plant are doing a really good job of keeping the weeds away from the plant itself, so with the newspaper trick and grass clippings on top of that, I should be in good shape.

Staking Out the Beans

Yesterday, I planted two rows (16 plants total) of pole beans, staked them and labeled the rows, and mulched around them. Additionally, I put up part of my garden fence (once I finish planting, I'll finish enclosing the garden.

Those two little rows wore me out so much that I went into the guest bedroom, flopped on my back on the bed, and took a zombie nap for a couple of hours. I was completely non-functional the rest of the evening.

Today, I managed to get out, plant two rows of soup beans (Lina Cisco's Bird Egg and Irish Creek Annie)--about 8 plants each), staked them, and watered the whole garden. That was enough for the evening.

At this rate, I might actually have my entire garden planted by August 1. [sigh]

Anyway, I planted today in my bare feet. Yes, people, I ignored my mother's advice from my childhood about not running around the yard without something on my feet and planted my toes in the grass and soil. The grass was soft and silky and cool as it caressed my soles; the dirt rough and rocky and...painful. Despite the pain, I managed to plant the two rows of beans before putting shoes back on for the staking. So why even bother to tend the garden with tender tootsies?

Microbes.

Microbes? Why would I want to capture microbes with my feet? The answer: for better health.

I know, it sounds counter-intuitive. We're supposed to avoid bugs at all costs, according to social norms. We're supposed to antibacterialize and disinfect our homes to avoid breathing in a single bacterium. That's supposed to be healthy.

But it's not. In fact, our urge to over-clean everything just may be at the root of several illnesses, not the least of which include an increased incidence in asthma, allergies, and autoimmune disorders. A review of the "hygiene hypothesis," by Fernando D. Martinez from the University of Arizona Respiratory Sciences Center lends credibility to the hypothesis that lack of exposure to microbes in childhood may result in allergies and other conditions. When a person is exposed to microbes, the body works to develop immunity toward those microbes--in a sense, the microbes act a bit like a vaccination. When a person isn't exposed to these microbes, the body doesn't have a chance to develop an immunity, and therefore may react allergically to these microbes when exposed to them later in life.

So...I'm inviting microbes in. How about you?

Bugs. Yuck.

I really don't care for bugs. I know that some of them are beneficial for the garden, and I do try to leave those to do their special garden tasks, but what I find super creepy are the bugs that eat my food. [I caught one mid-bite--take a look at the picture at left.]

Our weather here in Central Illinois has been crazy--warm and sunny one day, then cold, dreary and rainy for a couple of days, then cold and cloudy, then rainy, and so on. I haven't had two straight days of dry in order to be able to get into the garden until today, only to find that my soup beans are being terrorized--shredded, in fact--by the Mexican bean beetle. These horrible herbivores leave bean leaves in tatters and lay their eggs on the underside of bean leaves. They look remarkably like copper-colored ladybugs, but do far more damage. Now that they have nearly devastated my soup beans, they are encroaching upon my green beans!

How do I kill the little buggers without using any pesticides, I wonder. My boyfriend, David, helped me do a bit of Internet research, and it looks like garlic is the best defense (other than simply squashing them). I'll try some garlic powder on the leaves and around the base of the plants tomorrow, but you can bet I'll be squashing the life out of as many as I can and scraping the eggs off the leaves.

I do find it interesting that they headed for the soup bean plants first, and wonder whether planting cilantro among the green beans (a la "companion planting") has kept the damage to the green beans to a minimum. Hmmm...you would think that Mexican bean beetles would actually like cilantro, a pungent herb used in salsa!

April Showers Bring May Planting

"So, Michelle, how many bean plants do you think I should plant to sustain me through the year?" (My colleague/friend/compatriot-in-garden-crime planted green beans and peas for her family last year, so I thought she might advise me.)

"Oh, three or four plants ought to be enough."

"Oh." I was quiet for a moment. "So about 19 ought to be plenty, I guess."

She laughed. But she also knows my OCD ways, so I can't imagine it was any surprise to her. "How many pea plants did you put in?"

"Uh, about 20."

"You'll be spending a lot of time shelling peas!" She laughed again. I suspect her laughing is because this year, my gardening habits are very different from last year's. Last year, I think it was mid- to late-June before my garden got planted. I threw everything in at the same time--cool season foods and warm season foods. The only thing I really had were tomatoes, and they were tiny. (But I've already told you about my toy Beefsteak tomatoes.) This year, I'm taking my time. Every day we don't have rain (which admittedly hasn't been very many days yet), I'm out in the garden planting.

Yesterday I planted soup beans. Of course, I didn't plant just one variety--oh, no, that makes too much sense. I planted SIX varieties (Old Mother Stallard, Lina Cisco's Bird Egg, October, Hutterite, Jacob's Cattle Gasless, and Ireland Creek Annie), and about 5-6 plants of each. So I'll be shelling a lot of beans in addition to those peas!

Today, I planted three different kinds of beets (Choggia, Detroit Dark Red, and Bull's Blood); 2 types of radishes (Plum Purple and Early Scarlet Globe), 8 types of lettuce (Amish Deer Tongue, Bronze Arrowhead, Forellenschuss, Red Velvet, Susan's Red Bibb, Yugoslavian Red Butterhead, Lettuce Mix, and Apollo Arugula), 2 types of spinach (American and Strawberry), and White Vienna Kohlrabi.

I still have a lot of seeds and garden space in which to plant, but now it looks like it will rain very soon, so I've given up for today. The nightshade family plants (tomatoes, eggplant, and pepper plants) are still growing under the warming lamp, so I suspect it will be time to plant them soon.

I'm afraid to tell you how many different tomato varieties I will be planting.

Springing into Action

At last, spring is here!

I've been itching to till my garden, but in order to do so, I have to rake off the poisonous leaves and add the compost and organic soil to build up the garden. In order to till, the soil has to be dry enough that it won't compact when we till, but it seems that after every nice day or two, we have a significant rain.

So yesterday I decided it was time to set up the compost bin I bought on clearance at Lowe's for a ridiculous $62. Yes, I know, I could have just heaped the compost, but my goodness, this bin is black (and thus will absorb heat to help cook the compost), has slots that allow air to flow through, has another level I can add to it, and even has a hinged lid! Pretty exciting, let me tell you! It does everything but dance! After setting up the bin, which was pretty simple, I threw in shredded paper, cardboard, dead non-poisonous leaves, food scraps we've been saving, coffee grounds I begged from Panera, and some tiny twigs. I watered it all down to get it moving in the right direction.

Today was the second nice day in a row, and a quick look at my Amish Snap Peas, which were spindly and droopy, told me they needed some serious planting. So I picked a nice sunny spot in the yard (not in the garden), raked off the few black walnut leaves that covered the ground, and used The Claw (my favorite garden tool, purchased several years ago) to loosen up the ground. I then added some organic soil. I'm not certain they look much better tied to the tongue depressors swiped from a friendly doctor's office. I think I will have to find taller stakes.

My biggest worry is that we may have some hungry neighborhood rabbits who fancy feasting on my tender pea shoots. So I fenced the peas in with four $1 gates garnered from The Dollar Tree. Before you ask, yes, I do realize that rabbits can hop and conceivably could overleap the fence and eat the pea plants despite my efforts. But I'm not sure how else to keep them out, and I'm hoping the fence will deter them. I thought about getting a pellet gun and eating the rabbits I pop, but I'm not all that fond of the idea of dismantling and cleaning a rabbit for cooking.

Beans will be following the peas very soon. I planted a couple of varieties of green beans and several varieties of soup beans on April 9, and a few days ago, they were just pushing through the dirt. On Saturday, I walked out to the porch and--Bam!--they were a few inches high! Last night I raised my grow lamp up one notch, and it looks like I'll have to either raise it another notch or swap the tray for the tomato tray, where the seedlings are still small.

There is something very exciting about growing plants. Let's hope I can keep them alive...and uneaten!

I Think I Can Be Classified as OCD

It happened. I received my seed catalogs a few weeks ago and knew I had to place an order immediately. When my gardening buddy, Michelle, saw the Seed Savers certified-organic, heirloom bean sampler I had ordered, she asked me how many beans I was expecting to plant. (Garden-ese for "please, may I have some?"; of course, I promptly supplied her with some from each of the six varieties.) She also suggested donating some to our local college horticulture program, which I'll do. And then, I'll probably save the leftovers for next year and add some new varieties to the mix.

[Left to right, back row: Hutterite Soup, October, and Good Mother Stallard; front row: Jacob's Cattle Gasless, Ireland Creek Annie, and Lina Cisco's Bird Egg.]

But I didn't stop with beans. No, you just can't sustain yourself on just beans for a year. I've added plenty of veggies to the mix:

Peppers - Orange Bell, Chocolate Beauty, and Buran

Tomatoes - Amish Paste, Sweet Pea Currant, Red Zebra, John Baer, Marglobe Supreme, Illinois Beauty, Cherokee Purple, and Beefsteak (my favorite)

Lettuces - Amish Deer Tongue, Bronze Arrowhead, Forellenschuss, Red Velvet, Susan's Red Bibb, and Yugoslavian Red Butterhead

Other Greens - Strawberry Spinach, Apollo Arugula, America Spinach

Squash - Black Beauty Zucchini, Golden Zucchini

Eggplant - Florida High Bush

Radishes - Plum Purple, Early Scarlet Globe

Beets - Chioggia, Bull's Blood, Detroit Dark Red

Carrots - Danver's Half Long, Scarlet Nantes, Dragon

Okra - Clemson Spineless, Star of David

Peas - Green Arrow, Amish Snap

Green Beans - Ideal Market, Empress

Cucumbers - Double Yield, Boothby's Blonde, A&C Pickling

Celery - Cutting Celery

Onions - Australian Brown, Red of Florence

Herbs - Fernleaf Dill, Grandma Einck's Dill, Omega Flax, Santo Coriander, Cilantro/Coriander, Chives, Greek Oregano, Giant Parsley from Italy, Rosemary, Cinnamon Basil, Genovese Basil, Stevia

Edible Flowers - Dwarf Jewel Mix Nasturtiums, Empress of India Nasturtiums

So, as you can see, I have ordered far more seeds than I have room for in my garden. I got a bit carried away due to spring fever. But all is not lost--I will share some seeds and save some seeds for next year!