The veggies are in the ground!

This post took a bit longer than usual because I have been out and about in my garden and yard instead of at my keyboard.  I am feeling so fulfilled this week, and also mighty tired!  My Spring Garden is looking pretty fabulous if you ask me.  It is not quite finished, and I still have some winter crops in the ground (fava beans and Swiss Chard), but my beds have been refurbished with new soil, compost, and llama "beans", and I have expanded my growing space quite nicely with comparatively little effort.

Llama "beans"

Llama "beans", you say!?!  Yes, llama "beans."  Also called llama poop, but we llama aficionados prefer to call them "beans" because that is what they look like... blackish brown and about the size of a large bean.... and these "beans" make really excellent fertilizer!  Unlike cow manure or chicken manure, llama "beans" do not smell nor do they need to be aged, and they will not burn your seedlings or plants.  They can be used almost immediately on your flower and vegetable gardens as you would dry fertilizer (it is best to wait 24 hours after "manufacture."). Or put some in a container, add some water, and you have "Llama Bean Tea" for watering your plants!  Pretty awesome.  If you have llamas in your pasture, they just keep making more, so you always have a nice supply. But if you don't have llamas (or alpacas), see if you can locate one nearby and ask for some to try on your veggies, fruit, lawn and flowers.  You will be pleasantly surprised, I think!

One thing that I find myself dealing with once again, but this time in my gardening, is my inability to make decisions readily. What to plant?!  Where to plant it?!  When to plant it?!  What should I plant it next to and how many should I plant?!  ARGHH!  Sometimes I think I am getting better at making decisions, but then I find myself outside among my garden beds just staring at them and wondering what, which and when!

But decisions have been made at last, and what have I planted in my Spring Veggie Garden, you ask?!  Well, ...... there's:

   SLICING TOMATOES and  CHERRY TOMATOES

I have decided that next year I need to plant the tomatoes in larger peat pots than the ones I used this year. They really need to be able to get to be larger plants before I set them out, and I need to start them in my little greenhouses much sooner, also.  I have lost a few to cutworms already, before I remembered to dust them with some Sevin dust and surround them with tin cans.  Cutworms really like tiny tomato seedlings!

   PIMENTO PEPPERS (from seeds I saved from last year's crop) and FRYING PEPPERS (small red and yellow and orange peppers good for sauteing)

   YELLOW STRAIGHT NECK SQUASH, ZUCCHINI, * ACORN SQUASH, * PATTY PAN SQUASH, * SPAGHETTI SQUASH+, and * DELICATA SQUASH+.

Patty Pan or Button Squash

Spaghetti Squash

I have been finding some really interesting recipes for spaghetti squash.  I have always been a bit intimidated by this vegetable.  I found it too expensive in the grocery store for experimentation (what if I didn't like it?), and I figured that it probably took a lot of preparation that I was not sure I wanted to invest time in.  So I have ignored it until now, when a good friend gave me some seeds this Spring and told me how wonderful it is.  I am really looking forward to trying it!  Have any of you tried it?

Delicata Squash

* MUSKMELON (aka cantaloupe)

* MYSTERY MELON+ (Yes, that is what it is named! A sort of cross between a cantaloupe and honey-dew melon with a bit of watermelon thrown in for good measure?!)

* MALABAR SPINACH+ (a vining plant that has leaves that are like spinach and can grow in the heat, unlike spinach)

Malabar Spinach

   RADISHES (White Icicle)

* "CORN SALAD" (a mixture of lettuces that my friend shared with me)

* SALSIFY+ (a root vegetable with a taste like mushrooms and oysters?!  I am so totally intrigued!)

Salsify

* PARSNIPS+

Parsnips

* ASPARAGUS BEANS+ (really, really long beans with a unique flavor)

Asparagus Beans

   CUCUMBERS (slicing)

* LEMON CUCUMBERS+ (tennis ball size cukes that you can eat like a fruit ...  seeds given to me by a friend who says they are "yummy")

Lemon Cucumbers

* WATERMELON (Moon and Stars)

Moon and Stars Watermelon

I got the seeds for this special watermelon in the "goody bag" given to us at the final Wildflower Retreat....sigh! I can't wait to have a chance to remember that retreat with a slice of ice cold watermelon this summer!  I will save some seeds to plant each year from now on.  The memories of that final retreat will live on and on!  Only one seed sprouted, tho .... so I am keeping my green thumbs crossed that it will survive and produce.

* ONIONS (ones that I have grown from store-bought onion bottoms)

   GARLIC (planted last fall from cloves of store-bought garlic)

   EGGPLANT (Ichiban, my favorite for stir frying or roasting)

   SWISS CHARD ("Lucullus," which is one that can withstand heat better than the winter one that I planted and enjoyed, but chard is really a cool weather crop.

   OKRA (Clemson Spineless, from seeds I saved from my 2013 crop)

   HERBS:  Rosemary, Oregano, Cilantro and the all important Basil. I couldn't live without basil, for the fragrance and the taste!  This year I planted 4 types:  Basil, Purple Basil, Thai Basil, and Greek Basil.  The Thai Basil smells peppery!  I will take photos of all four kinds for a later post.  Promise!

AND

the * Fava beans+, *Swiss chard, and *Brussel sprouts (left over from my Winter Garden)

The * indicates those I have never grown before, and + beside them means I have never even eaten them, but I want to try them!

Fava Beans

The fava beans finally started making some bean pods this week.  I hope to be enjoying them soon, but it is like waiting for chickens to grow teeth!  I think the strange weather has really upset their normal growth pattern. Meanwhile, I still see my little green lizard friend enjoying his/her guard duty against bugs high up in the bean stalks!

My Brussel Sprouts plant in the garden

I love Brussel sprouts and I bought this plant last Spring as a seedling at the feed store.  I am not sure when it will be ready to harvest, but it has made leaves and stalks and I can see what looks to be tiny sprouts along the stem of one stalk.  No wonder the darn things are so expensive in the grocery .... seems they take forever to be ready to eat!

Teensy tiny Brussel Sprouts on the stem!

So, a pretty ambitious garden, wouldn't you say?!  Well, I am hoping to save substantially on my grocery bills, and maybe even my medical bills with this year's crop.  I will be eating healthier this way, and working in a garden is a great way to be active, fuel your soul, and cut down on stress in your life.  But I have never had this large of a garden, or this many types of vegetables.  I am excited about new tastes and textures, and I am already finding some interesting recipes online that will put my produce to good use.  Got any recipes for me?  Please share! I plan to start a recipe page on my blog to feature them and those I find myself.

Speaking of being ambitious with a vegetable garden, my Daddy is probably the King of Garden Ambition.  When he retired from corporate work in Corpus Christi and Houston, where he had spent the last ten or so years living in apartments, he couldn't wait to move rural and have a "Big Garden."  So my parents moved to a small town in East Texas on about 2 acres, and Daddy planted a HUGE garden the very first year... including 70 tomato plants!  For two people!  There were also cucumbers, peppers, yellow squash and zucchini, and to this day I can still hear my mother say to him: "Edwin, if you bring one more zucchini or cucumber into this house I am going to beat you with it!" Strangely, the weather was unusual that first summer in the country. Seems Daddy's huge garden was the only one whose tomato plants produced in that area so he had no trouble giving away a large percentage of his proudly produced produce!

Now, back to the present.  Some of my winter crops didn't suit my fancy, after all.  At least not as far as how the ones I grew turned out when I cooked them.  I was quite disappointed with my turnips and beets as they did not taste like I wanted them to taste.  The greens were delicious for both, but not the tubers themselves.

Kolrabi bulb harvested in April

I was also not impressed with the taste or development of the kohlrabi, a vegetable popular in Europe and a food reportedly full of great benefits to our health.  I think that most likely I need to do some research on the cultivation of these three vegetables.  Maybe my soil was too heavy or not the right pH, or maybe I planted them too close to each other, or didn't keep the soil moist enough during the developmental stage of the roots.  Right now, I am not leaning toward planting them again anytime soon.  I have decided that when I want beets, I will grab me a can off the grocery store shelf, or check out the price of the ones in the produce aisle.  I just love Harvard Beets and Pickled Beets!

Now ... remember the Lady Banks roses that grow on an arbor over my driveway side door? I had shared a photo of them taken back in late March and they looked like this:

And then two weeks ago, it turned into this almost overnight!  We have already had to trim it back a bit so we could get into the house without ducking our heads!  It is what inspired one of my early haiku poems.

Rose boughs ‘bove my door

What makes you so boisterous?

Have you had your say?

Rose boughs 'bove my door

Explode with dainty yellow.

Clearly you do speak!

We sure do enjoy writing haiku and digging in the dirt on HeartSong Farm!