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My garden is mostly a dead weed covered jungle right now. That's not right. This time of year, it should be growing collards, lettuce,green onions, carrots and snow peas. These are cool weather crops that we can't grow well in the heat to come.
I've let it lay fallow because I have been doing so much inside remodeling work. It was just a matter of priorities. The garden was expendable since it is more for enrichment than subsistence.
I did get out there and chop up one of my growing beds last week and I have been using carpet scraps from remodeling to smother weeds, so part of the work is done.
I'm thinking of trying Burpee's "new" purple carrot ( which is really an old carrot color) as an experiment. For lettuce, I'll go with green ice lettuce and good old black seeded simpson. Both are proven non-bolters, which is important down here where you never know how soon the heat will come.
It's a beautiful, blue sky day here with highs forecast to be in the 60's. Perfect weather for planting that garden.
...after all, rabbits and deer have to eat too.
10 comments:
We grew purple potatoes last summer, but haven't tried the purple carrot yet. Our lettuce always bolts. Can never eat it fast enough, and we lose part of the crop every summer. We grow the mesclun mix which gives us a variety of leafy greens to choose from. Quite tasty, although the last batch had a preponderance of peppery and spicy leaves. Interesting, but wouldn't want to eat it in every salad.
You're very good to the rabbits and deer. That is one cute bunny!
We had 61F here in my part of kansas yesterday. However, I do not view it as a sign of temps to come, at least in the immediate future, so will pass on the carrot planting for a few months yet. More like, is it dry enough to get around the field to cut brush and limbs back, or do we need to wait for it to refreeze. Happy planting!
RD,
Years ago in Savannah, I grew a blue potato called, "All blue" and a yellow watermelon called "Yellow Doll". That's a big part of the appeal of gardening, being able to grow things the stores don't carry.
OA,
We still have a lot of cold weather and freezes to come, but the soil never really gets cold so any frost tolerant veggie like the ones I mentioned are good to grow this time of year.
Thanks, Floridacracker, for the vision of sunshine. Here in Minnesota it is cloudy with a bit of freezing drizzle, with temps around 32. We saw the sun for about an hour yesterday afternoon, that was it for about the whole month of December! No wonder I was in a funk on Christmas eve.
I try to make it a rule not to even look at a seed catalog until after New Year's; I'm looking forward to seeing all the nice varieties and planning my garden. I haven't grown blue potatoes, although I grew a purple-skinned white potato last year called Viking Purple that was pretty good. Do you get the Baker Creek catalog? I think I have a link to them on my blog; they always have some interesting stuff.
Okay, you got me dreaming about my garden now...
Deb,
I'll check out your Baker Creek link. If I hurry, I can get in a winter crop of those veggies mentioned above and still plant the warmer stuff around mid-March. I really like having lettuce to pick and it's just too hot here for it after March.
Now you just need the purple broccoli and the purple okra and you'll be all set!
FC, It's actually in the mid 50's up here today, with thunderstorms likely! Can't wait for some pictures of your garden! I'll just stick to my hops for now. They'll start poking through the ground again in late March or early April.
Rurality,
I actually grew a burgundy okra once. It was pretty, but nobody ate it. We are okraphobic.
ThunderD,
Right now it would be a picture of dirt.
Rain, rain, rain and more rain...that's what we had up until today. We have a slight break until the next storm comes in tomorrow and then rain, rain, rain and more rain. I suppose I should count my blessings that it is not snow and that we don't worry about flooding due to living in the mountains.
We have jack-rabbits here that eat everything that the deer don't eat. It doesn't much matter, though, because I don't any spots on my property that get all-day sun except right in front of my house and I'm too vain to have veggie stem-gardens as part of my home's curb appeal.
Hick,
My garden is a little too shady also. I need to girdle an encroaching oak.
"Veggie Stems" LOL!
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