A Little Late or REALLY Early!

We ended up heading to the coast Friday and I had intended to do an early post on Thursday, but that didn't happen. Then I thought I might do a post when we came back on Saturday and then that didn't happen. Sundays are too busy to do what we think we might want to do so nothing again.

I have a total down day (mostly) today and am catching up on a couple of things. Posting here is one of them!

For some reason I thought about growing beans to store. So, after doing some research online to figure out what kind of beans to get, I finally decided on these beans that are called Tongues of Fire. I wasn't sure how to cultivate a dry bean so I just let the plants grow. As is turns out, it's not that hard and all I had to do is pick the pods when they are dry and brittle. They actually are still a little "fresh" after shelling them, but they dried up pretty quickly. Hoping that there will be enough still to harvest to make this year's effort worth it.

My fall crops are looking GREAT! I did transplant some of the seedlings into 4" pots at the end of last week and they are growing like crazy! The garden spot which I want to put my fall crops into is being prepared right now - I probably will get stuff in within the next couple of weeks. 

Took a walk around the garden and ended up harvesting a few items. This might be the last time I have a mini-bounty of items. I was surprised to find a few of the Shishito Peppers ready to pick. The few that I got will be it for the season. 

Since it took me awhile to find the plants that I did have I decided to try saving some of the seeds for next season. I haven't been able to find the seeds at the store and I haven't seen them offered in my favorite seed catalogs. Yet another experiment!

Look at this perfect tomato! I was getting ready to close up the Hoop House for the night and before I got to the door I spied this tomato hiding in almost plain sight! I never noticed it changing color - then BAM! Vine Ripened Goodness!

There are quite a few Roma tomatoes that are in different stages of ripening. I'm hoping for a lot at one time so I can make sauce - from my own garden to save for future use. 

As my summer crops are coming to an end, I look forward to getting the fall crops in and starting to harvest the greens in the weeks to come. The real test will be how many of my seedlings will survive the transition. This is my first time trying out fall crops. It has been exciting checking out the seedlings several times a week and seeing the growth. I am pretty confident with my skills with the summer garden. Now all I need to do is start incorporating succession planting. After I get that down I'll work on crop rotation. 

There is so much to learn! So much fun!!!

Fun Day Friday and a Photo too...

Friday is always a little more relaxed around the office with several personnel off this fine day!

I've noticed that as things start slowing down in the garden, there isn't a whole lot to take care of - except for the cherry tomatoes which are producing like crazy!

However, that will change soon enough when my seedlings are big enough to be transplanted into the garden. Of course, we'll need to prepare a space for these little guys and also provide some frost protection for the cooler months.

So, on with the photo "show"

Since I plan to continue working the hoop house through the fall  months, I needed some sort of lighting system to do so. One morning Tom went and got an old string of of white christmas lights (C7 bulb size) and thought that it would do the trick. Boy does it ever! I'm pretty excited - even if it is raining or whatever, I will be able to continue "playing" in the hoop house and tending to what ever I have going in the trays.

The seedlings are doing great! one of my trays needs to be revamped, but the seedlings are fine. I am going to take the purple broccoli and the asian greens and transplant them into the square plastic pots that I have been saving for this very occasion. I have to keep telling myself that this is an experiment and to not get all disappointed if and when things don't work out. So far everything has sprouted, some more than others.

This is my attempt at succession planting for the fall crops. Most of these are repeats of what I have in the first two trays.

This is just ONE of the roma tomato plants that is growing in the hoop house. To think that I thought that there would be no tomatoes. Man, I'm going to be busy making sauce and such to put in the freezer!

These are nice slicing tomatoes of which we only have two in the hoop house. These guys are ripening fast! Much quicker than the romas. It seems like they only JUST started to turn pink and now less than a week later they are red! Hoping these have good flavor! We haven't been disappointed with any of the romas yet.

All in all, the summer gardening season has been fairly successful except for a couple of things. I am looking forward to getting the fall crops into the ground and hopefully harvesting fresh greens before we know it!

Everything is a learning experience and I am having fun with experimenting and taking notes for the next season!

Get out and try planting some fall crops there are so many things that will work well!

Transition

This week I started to feel like things are starting to change. The mornings are cooler and the sun is coming up later and setting earlier. It's almost fall...

There are way too many tomatoes that need to ripen before the first frost...

September 11, 2016

This one plant has so many tomatoes on it...I'm excited! The one at  the bottom was the first that I spied a couple of months ago and I plucked it off the plant on Monday. We also ate it soon after I brought it in the house and washed it up and cut that baby open...it was very tasty!

It has been a while since we have grown anything bigger than a cherry tomato with success. One year the plants that we had planted near the Lavendar which now that I have looked should have been a good pairing, but the plants ended up very unhappy and we didn't have many tomatoes. Other plants, in the boxes did okay, but again, not terribly happy.

NOW in the hoop house they exploded and grew like crazy. I'm happy to see many of the fruit starting to turn. It's encouraging to think that there might be more than the ONE that I plucked a few days ago.

Here's to a nice harvest sooner than later.

Fall Crops

Back in July I ordered this fun gardening tool:

I've been wanting to try it out since it arrived back in July. Actually, I did try out the mini one. The blocks were so tiny that they dried out too quickly - especially in the heat of the hoop house during what had to be the hottest time of the year.

The weather started to get less hot and I decided to try starting some stuff for our fall garden. It's a little on the late side, but then that's how everything has been in our garden all year anyway, so why not continue the trend?

On Labor Day I got out the trays that Tom built for me and got to work. Got a total of 84 2" blocks formed and we sowed all sorts of cool weather friendly veggies - purple broccoli, a variety of greens, some beets, flower sprouts, green onions and the list goes on.

The other thing that I ordered was a Fogg-It nozzle:

The perfect tool to keep the delicate seedlings moist without blasting the soil apart with a regular hose. It really is a pretty neat little tool. Another thing about this particular brand, Tom actually had a neat little valve to connect the nozzle to the hose. The brand was Fogg-It! He has had it for so long that he doesn't remember where he got it. Which is just fine because it is perfect and makes the watering task easy to manage.

So far everything looks so good! I was really surprised to see things starting to sprout by the end of the week! With the mild weather the humidity and temps in the hoop house have been perfect for the little seedlings to thrive - I am amazed at how well things are working out so far. These little dudes are pretty happy and I'm sure that they are growing before our eyes!

September 12, 2016

The real test will be what happens once they are big enough to go into the garden. Will they survive or will they grow even more?! I can hardly believe that starting seeds is really this easy. It wasn't so easy earlier this year in the spring. These tools along with the finished hoop house will give us a jump on the next season for sure.

Until then, we will be experimenting with the fall garden and recording the happenings here as a record of what we did and what worked and didn't work.

This gardening thing is gonna stick somehow - it's been good so far!