Strawberries and raab yield to raspberries and broccoli
After the astonishing, five-gallon
day, our
strawberry harvest began to decline. Now we're down to just
a gallon or two a day, but that's okay because I'm sated...and the
red raspberries are starting to ripen.
Similarly, the kale
buds have nearly all turned into flowers, removing raab from the
menu, but broccoli is taking their place. The broccoli heads
(like this
year's garlic)
are smaller than average, but the cold weather has also resulted
in very few cabbage worms, so I'm happy. Other vegetables
we're currently eating in profusion include snap peas and lettuce.
The whole garden is starting to look like the
coming-attractions section of a homesteading movie. The
first tomato flowers don't mean much since those fruits take a
long time to ripen, but cucumber and bean flowers mean we could be
enjoying those two vegetables within a week or two. And
don't get me started on the peaches, apples, gooseberries, and
blueberries studding the trees and bushes or I'll go back out with
the camera and make this post far too long.
What's ripe (or ripening) in your garden?
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About us: Anna Hess and Mark Hamilton spent over a decade living self-sufficiently in the mountains of Virginia before moving north to start over from scratch in the foothills of Ohio. They've experimented with permaculture, no-till gardening, trailersteading, home-based microbusinesses and much more, writing about their adventures in both blogs and books.
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Here on the GA coast, I dug my red potatoes planted the third week of February yesterday. I planted too many too close together. I think next year I will plant fewer farther apart and I bet I will get the same amount (weight) of spuds, just fewer but bigger. My onions are ready to pull too. I only have a 5'x20' main garden area, plus some raised beds with tomatoes, cukes and yellow squash in other areas.
Once it's all harvested, sweet corn and pole beans go in. Locals tell me it's "too late" to plant corn, but it works out just fine. I get sweet corn in late August, when their Feb/March planted corn has long since been harvested and died back. Plus my beans use the corn stalks to grow up around.
Jane --- You might like this post, which shows some aerial photos of our core homestead. Or this post mapping our sun patterns. You can also see the original house here.
Eric --- I'm all for succession planting corn. We're a lot cooler than you, but we keep planting corn from April until the middle of July, which gives us sweet corn to eat from July to October. On the other hand, my father (who gardens in the piedmont of South Carolina) does find it too dry to plant many things in the summer, so maybe that's what your neighbors are talking about?
I would love to report that we are eating lots of goodies from the garden, but it has been the most disappointing spring I have ever experienced. Cold weather, late frosts kept many things from growing, or even sprouting at all. NONE of the potatoes came up -none! I have never had that happen. Then the weather turned to summer almost overnight, and all the cool weather things bolted before I could harvest. The chickens got lots of spinach and chi ese cabbage. The brocolli tried to flower, but since the plants are still only about 6 i nches tall, the florests are miniscule. I will probably just throw those to the hens too. We are getting some nice lettuce, but even the kale is really slow. Go figure!
And it might all burn up anyway. The largest wildland fire in NM is burning all around us, 32 square miles in size, about a mile and a half away at its nearest point. Our only access road has been closed ( we are allowed to go one direction through checkpoints) and they have been testing the emergency notification system- not very comforting. We got a "test call" at midnight last night! On a happier note, I was excited to discover two almonds sprouting in the compost pile, and have potted them with loving care. Who knows?