John's Junk Drawer - Garden (& lawn)

Recycle Poster

nospam@example.com (John) — Sat, 23 May 2015 21:34:36 +0000

Here's a pdf of my county's recycle info poster. . .

Riverside Recycling (pdf)

Garden 2014

nospam@example.com (John) — Tue, 30 Dec 2014 03:58:00 +0000

A close-up of a Brussels Sprout plant.

All the garden entries from the 2014 growing season have been placed here.

All in all it was a good growing season. Tomatoes, as usual, were amazing and produced unexpectedly large harvests. That said there was a bout of bacterial speck to be dealt with about midway through the season.

First time growing Brussels Sprouts seemed to go well. They are so much tastier when ripened on the plant (less bitterness, but more flavor). Also grew Italian Choice Red Bell Peppers, and String Beans. All delicious, though it took a bit of time to figure out how to properly prepare them.

. . . . . . .
While the blog entries are organized most recent entries first, the log will be listed from the start of the season in the spring, to the end of the season in October.

CAUTION: This entry contains many pictures.

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Here We Go, 17-May-2014.

Same size as last year, buried soaker hose irrigation.
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Garden Overview — 2014 garden begins. Foreground: Brussels Sprouts. . . . . Behind them (where the stakes are): String beans. . . . . . Back-right: four tomato plants, . . . . . . . . Back-left: Italian Choice, red, Bell Peppers. . . Notice the fixtures at the front-left: I'm trying all underground irrigation this year, using soaker hoses.

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Soaker Hose Lessons, 29-May-2014.
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Ooops. . . Learning — I broke my garden yesterday. Latest Gardening Lesson: When using buried soaker hoses to irrigate, you must exercise care when you add trellises or stakes.

Use Pressure Regulators With Soaker-Hoses (30-May) — For four years I've tried all different brands of sprinkler- and soaker-hoses. They all spewed tons of water out in the last few feet, and almost no water for most of the length. Thought it was bad brands of soaker hose. This year I learned that soaker-hoses aren't made to deal with full municipality water pressure (50-60 psi). If you don't want to blow out your soaker-hoses the first time you turn them on, you need to add pressure regulators. These (the two black things you see here) are less than $10 each, and seem to work fine. They reduce city water (50-60 psi) down to 10-20 psi pressure. So far, this has proven to work for me.

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Off to a Great Start, 30-May-2014.
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Garden Overview — Front: Brussels Sprouts. . . Behind them: String Beans. . . Behind them: Place where the "Italian Choice" red peppers will be planted (they are currently being grown from seed inside). . . On the right: Four tomato plants.

Tomatoes — The two in the back are Better Boys, which are indeterminate. This (indeterminate) means they will keep right on producing until something (like a frost) stops them. . . . The two in the foreground are determinate (Better Bush). That (determinate) means they have a specific set of life-phases they grow through, which terminates in fruit production. When they are done, they are done, regardless of whether there is still more season left. In general, I don't like determinates for this reason, but was absent-minded on the day I purchased these two. . .

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State of the Garden, 07-June-2014.
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The Garden — Left to right: Brussels Sprouts, String Beans, Tomatoes. The egg crate hangin' with the tomatoes is red-pepper sprouts that were germinated indoors. They are almost ready for planting in the space behind the tomatoes (another inch or two of growth needed).

18-June:

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Peppers In, 18-June-2014.
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Red Bell Peppers (Italian Choice): — This is the first time I was able to germinate the seeds indoors. This is an important step to master, before you can start doing heirloom seeds. There are nine plants here, though I have had to replant a couple of them because the birds think my garden is their playground.

The white plastic stakes mark where the soaker hose is buried.

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Garden 23-June-2014.
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Garden Overviews — (left to right): Brussels Sprouts, String Beans, Tomatoes (Better Bush in Front, Better Boy in back). Behind the tomatoes, there are nine, newly planted, red bell pepper plants (Italian choice, red).

Tomatoes Gone Wild: — I left four feet between plants this year. The most so far. Still, it looks like they will combine into a single large bush before the season is out.

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Brussels Sprouts, 01-July-2014.
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When Our Soccer Team is About to Play Belgium — The Brussels Sprouts are a bit wilted in the heat today. Maybe it's a good sign.

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Garden With Tomatoes, 06-July-2014.
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Into Every Life — The tomatoes sustained quite a bit of wind damage in last week's storms, but, with a few well-placed stakes, and lots of ties, they're back upright. Looks like lots of tomatoes are on the way. . . God willing.

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Second String-Bean Harvest, 09-July-2014.
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They're good for your heart — 2nd string-bean harvest just over 2 pounds. Looks like there is at least another harvest on the vines that is almost ready. Incidentally, wasps really are the a**holes of the gardening world. I take solace in the notion that some people think their stings lower MS activity.

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Garden 11-July-2014.
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Brussels Sprout Close Up — This is a closeup of one of the Brussels Sprouts. It shows how each branch has one Brussels Sprout in its crux. They start out as a little tiny speck, and grow bigger with time, looking like little dark green blobs. This picture is a nice one because it shows them in various stages of development. There's one near the top (left) that is starting to show the normal appearance of a leafy sprout.

Heavy Duty Stakes — Another tomato basket fell over. This is a six foot, 1x2 stake that I drove about 2.5 feet into the ground with a sledge hammer. It surely did some root damage. These are the heaviest-duty cages I have found, and they still aren't up to the task. I need to find a better solution. Perhaps next year I will drive the stakes in when I set up the cages.

Place of Peace — (Accidental Feng Shui)

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First Tomato Harvest, 14-July-2014.
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First Tomatoes — They're a lot like the first pancake on the grill. A little raggedy and imperfect. You can't see it here, but many of the tops are split. That means I've been over-watering a little, and will correct course.

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The Garden, 16-July-2014.
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Thank goodness for poop in a bag — Serious compost shortage this year.

Rooting at a break — A branch broke almost completely off. I left it alone because it had flowers on the end, but then it started growing roots just after the break. I did what any self respecting gardener would do. Cut it off and plant it in the ground. We'll see how it does. --- UPDATE: It's doing nicely. See 2014/07/24.

Third string bean harvest. — Just under two pounds.

2nd tomato harvest — They're still coming from the bottom branches, so there are a lot of uglies, but there are also quite a few nice ones. And, just so you know, the uglies are just as tasty as the pretties.

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Garden, 19-22, July, 2014.
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Garden 2014.07.19 — You can see the root damage showing up from where the 6 foot post had to be driven. These leaves are turning yellow. If it was one of the blights, they would be turning more of a beige color (i think). You can also see where I've started the planned expansion for next year. Unlike NATO, this expansion is entirely within my own back yard.

Single serving string-bean harvest — I didn't get any until the third harvest, so did not have any feedback on what I was doing wrong in harvesting and preparation. The first three harvests were not so good. Now I'm starting to learn, though. The only ones with any flavor are the green ones (greener the better). The white and yellow ones taste like the beans in pork-and-beans if you were to rinse off the sauce. Cut off 1/4 to 1/2 inch from each end and boil for 10 minutes or so. I have not been able to make saute preparation work yet.

Tomatoes — Harvests are averaging about 6-12 per day with about 80-90% of them pretties. In the beginning of the harvest season most of them were uglies.

More — Last year I was harvesting once a week so it was easy to keep tallies of the yields. This year it is every morning or afternoon, so it doesn't make sense to keep a count.

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Ongoing Garden, 24-July-2014.
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From a Branch to a Plant — This is the tomato plant that was started from a broken branch (see 2014/07/16). You can see that it is really coming back nicely here.

Garden Expansion — The expansion is coming along. I put the birdbath in the middle of the newly scraped area.

— View of the garden from the kitchen window

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Tomatoes Peaking, 01-12, August, 2014
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Oops — Did I say 6-12 per day? I'd like to revise that. It looks like, for a while anyway, it will be 2-3 dozen per day.

2014.08.05 - Garden overview — L to R: Brussels Sprouts, String Beans, Tomatoes. You can't see the peppers behind the tomatoes, but they're there and doing fine.

Perfect! —Nicest tomato I've grown, to date.

Recognize this guy? — t was planted from a branch that had broken off one of the plants and started to sprout roots (see 2014.07.16). It is doing well and now has flowers. Should be producing tomatoes before you know it. Lesson? If this produces good tomatoes, next year I'll buy one of each variety and start extras from clippings.

Tomatoes Galore — Today's tomato harvest had much nicer pretties, in much greater numbers, than usual.

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Bacterial Speck, 26-August to 5-September, 2014.
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Bacterial Speck — The tomatoes contracted something called "bacterial speck" about three weeks ago, which I was not able to treat. I was lopping off yellow branches every day and not keeping up. Finally was able to treat them with copper, which stopped --or at least slowed-- the dying branches. I've still been lopping off foliage, but now, most of it is left over from before the treatment.

Close-up — This is leaf speck (aka bacterial speck). Note the yellow hallos around dark brown specks. - - You should treat it with copper at the very first sign. I waited three weeks before starting treatment, which has probably doomed my tomatoes to an early end-of-season.

Bacterial Speck — I've been out every day pruning dead and dying branches. The existing tomatoes, which are normally hidden in the foliage, are completely exposed. While they still have that amazing garden-ripened taste, the lack of shelter from sun and wind causes them to have tougher-than-usual skin.

Overview — Here's the garden as of 2014.08.26 In the foreground (near the bird-bath), you can see the tomato plant that was started from a branch. It now has flowers and should be good for some late fruit. Unlike the mature plants, it only just started to show signs of leaf speck when I was finally able to apply the copper treatment, so it cleared right up. The cinder block you see there was discovered during the garden expansion effort.

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Peppers, 8-September-2014
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Peppers are doing great ! — Multiple peppers on each plant and new flowers too!

The peppers are Italian Choice Red. — I was worried they went in too late, but here we are with plenty of season left, and peppers starting to turn red.

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State of the Garden, 04-07, October-2014.
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Second pepper harvest. — I like the red ones because you can tell when they're ripe. Few things are more disappointing to eat than a pepper that ain't ripe.

— Still more peppers to harvest.

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The tomato plant started from a branch is doing well. Lots of tomatoes and flowers.

— The sick tomatoes are recovering nicely. it has taken a lot of pruning, and copper treatments.

Brussels Sprouts after two harvests — The way their stalks grow makes them look a little like palm trees.

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Visitor, 14-October-2014.
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A visitor to the garden —

Close-Up — Just hangin' out under the palm trees that smell like cabbage.

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Aphids, 16-October-2014.
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Aphids on the Brussels Sprouts — Aphids LOVE plants from the cabbage family (like the brussels sprouts). They seem to prefer the leaves and leave (sorry) the sprouts alone. Dusting the plants with Sevin does nothing noticeable to rid them. I'll have to research some better solutions for next year.

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Pepper Harvest, 20-October-2014.
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— Peppers are producing well. The deeper the red, the sweeter the pepper.

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Frost/Freeze Reports, 06-November-2014.
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The saddest day of the growing season — Lots of green tomatoes. I have been ripening them as needed by placing a bunch in a brown-paper-bag and closing it up. This produced fairly good ripe tomatoes that I thought would be on par with store bought tomatoes. Boy was I wrong. I had forgotten just how bad store-bought tomatoes are.

Post script: Why Do Store-bought Tomatoes Taste So Bad?

At this writing (24-December) I just purchased my first store-bought tomatoes of the season. They were AWFUL. They were nearly perfect to look at, and bright red, but they had a texture like a raw potato, but with less flavor.

I used to think store-bought tomatoes were bad because they picked them bright-green and then let them ripen in transit. I can no longer support that thesis, since, the home-grown tomatoes I have been ripening from a bright-green state, were WAY better than the store-bought tomatoes.

So I went back and learned a thing or two about how "big-food" does tomatoes. It turns out they pick them bright green, but then they gas them with ethylene to turn them red. The industry marketing effort is quite insistent that this is the same thing as if the fruit had ripened naturally, but judging by the taste, I'd say that may be a (big) stretch.

My guess. The ethylene hormone causes them to ripen (turn red) but does little or nothing to promote the normal process of breaking down the starches, which turn into sugars. Again, starches are the things that have a taste and texture reminiscent of potatoes but with less flavor.

Well, that's my theory. I've read the big-food releases that blame it on other stuff (like the varieties of tomato selected), but those theories just don't pass the smell test (sorry).

Garden: 2013

nospam@example.com (John) — Wed, 23 Oct 2013 17:21:00 +0000

A slice of store bought tomato with two slices from the garden

All the garden entries from the 2013 growing season have been placed here, in this single entry to reduce clutter on the blog.

While the blog entries are organized most recent entries first, the log will be listed from the start of the season in the spring, to the end of the season in October.

This entry contains many pictures.

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Prepping (and Expanding) the Growing Bed, 13-April-2013.

   About twice as big as last year.
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The spring garden — Slightly more than double the area of last year's garden.

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Off to a nice start, 21-May-2013.

   Radishes are very fast. They're ready to pick.
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Radishes Ready to Pick — Radishes (ready to pick) in foreground. Tomatoes in background.

Peas — Peas in foreground, Tomatoes in background.

Beets — Beets... sort-of... I tried beet and carrot seeds in strips to save some time when sowing. Bad move. Both of those crops are decimated, and growing poorly in the cold spring. You live, you learn. From now on, loose seeds, or pre-planted.

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State of the Garden, 29-May-2013.

   And the last of the radish harvest.
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Final Radish Harvest — The left-over dregs from the radish patch. These look knarly because I didn't properly thin the crop. These were left in the ground for an extra week after the main harvest.

Overview — Three tomato plants in front, sharing row with some decimated beets. Carrots (also decimated) and snap-peas to the right. To the left: more beets, and fallow ground (back-left corner) where the radishes were growing.

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The State of the Garden, 6-June-2013.

   Off to a good start.
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Italian beets in foreground next to tomato plants (right). Regular beets behind. Carrots and peas back in the right-back corner.

Carrots — I used seed strips for these (instead of loose seeds). They would probably be perfect had we had a normal spring, but it was a very cold spring, so the rows are decimated.

Lesson? Loose seeds or pre-started are probably the best way to go.

Peas — Starting to produce.

Beets — Sparse, but growing nicely.

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Ode To The Compost Pile, 13-June-2013

   Be it ever so humble, the compost pile is the star of the garden
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The compost pile. Humble as can be, yet it is the undisputed star of the lawn and garden.

It is mostly grass-clippings, so a lot of the expensive fertilizer you buy to make your grass grow gets recycled and re-used.

Many other things you'd normally have to bag and throw away as waste go right in here too. This includes leaves, kitchen scraps, and all the non-edible parts of your garden plants.

BTW: If you are going to compost grass clippings you will need to switch to the no-name, non-weed killing fertilizer (plain ol' 10-10-10, or 12-12-12 work fine). The expensive name-brand crap has all kinds of bad things in it, like crab-grass preventer. If that's in your compost pile and you use it in your garden, you wont be able to start plants from seeds. That's because those fancy name-brand, weed-killing mixes work by preventing all seeds from germinating. Exactly what you want for keeping crab-grass at bay, but not for vegetable gardens.

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Beets. First and second harvests, 19-June-2013

  First and second harvests of beets.
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Regular beets on the left. The row of smaller red beets across the top are Italian beets.

I never thinned the beets early on, so these are the rejects from a very late thinning. The red beets are Italian, the purple beets are regular. They are small because they compete with their neighbors for sunlight. This forces them to commit most of their energy and resources for leaf-production instead of bulb-production.

Italian beets are sweet like the purple ones, but grow in concentric rings. This should make for a nice plate-garnish, or salad presentation. Shown here is a cross-section of Italian beets showing red and white rings.

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Tomatoes, and the last of the early beets, 26-June-2013

  Beets. Third (and last) harvest. Tomatoes, still green, but growing well.
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This is the remainder of the beet crop, which had been left in the ground from last week. Beets (unlike radishes) are somewhat forgiving about when they are harvested.

Tomatoes aplenty, but still green — Lots of tomatoes, currently green, coming to a tomato plant soon.

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The Tomato Harvest Begins (sort of), 2-July-2013

  The tomato harvest has started.
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Only a couple of ripe ones so far, but it looks very promising for the near future.

There are lots of green tomatoes that will (God willing) be ripe tomatoes soon. The little pile on the ground were either ready-to-pick, or fell off when I was pruning dead/yellow branches.

Lots of tomatoes no matter from what angle you look.

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After beets and radishes - What to plant, 7-July-2013

  After harvesting the early crops, there is fallow ground.
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One important task for a gardener is to properly plan, in order to ensure utilization of the growing season.

The harvest of the radishes and beets left a lot of fallow ground to fill. Here are four honeydew plants in the foreground. I don't know if honeydews require trellis or not. They're there just in case, until I research it. There are two red bell-pepper plants behind the honeydews. Still quite a bit of space that needs planting.

. . . . .
[NOTES]

It turns out you don't need trellises. If you use them, you will have to construct "slings" from cloth in order to hold the weight of the fruit, since the plant's tendrils will not be enough to support the weight of the melons.

To grow them without trellises place flat tiles under the fruit as they form, so that they will not sit in water, or rot on the damp ground.

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Tomato Harvest in Full Swing, 11-July-2013

  Even a bit of vandalism seems to have been taken in stride.
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The tomato harvest is on the up-swing — There was some vandalism this week. It looked like somebody leaned against two of the tomato cages to get a better look and pushed one of them completely over. Could have been a big critter (skunk or possum). As you can see here, some strategically placed stakes, along with more bread-ties than I care to admit, and they're back upright. About a half dozen tomatoes were lost. Still, not a bad haul for this week. Hopefully the plants will recover and keep producing.

All you need is a little salt.

Another day, another dozen (or so) tomatoes. If a drenching storm is in the forecast, you should pick the tomatoes that are starting to turn orange. Otherwise, your ripening tomatoes will split open. I took another bunch on the 12th, bringing the total tomato count for the first week to 60.

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State of the Garden, 16-July-2013

  Everything seems to be braving the heat, so far.
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The garden. Tomato plants braving the heat as best they can. To the right there are the honeydew plants, and on the extreme right are the carrots (still not right, kinda stubby, any ideas?). There are also peppers behind the tomatoes that you can't see.

If there were a calendar for tomatoes, these girls would be on it. — There are still about a dozen on the plants that I'll pick before going back to O.C. That will bring the haul for this week to just under 3 doz

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The State of the Garden, 28-July-2013.

   Tomatoes are .
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Vive La Difference — A couple of slices of a tomato picked from the garden, vs a slice of store-bought tomato.

Overview — After yesterday's tomato harvest, it looks like there will be another dozen or so. Would never have guessed this much yield from only three plants. They're really doing well, even in this heat. Bell peppers directly behind the tomato plants. On the right, the newly planted honeydew crop has LOTS of flowers. Once again, with the finishing up of the carrots and peas, I'm faced with a great deal of fallow growing land. I'll have to find something good to plant soon, so as not to waste too much growing time.

Tomatoes are looking good — This is the first harvest of the week that had (mostly) ripened on the vine before I picked them. These will probably be even tastier than usual. The plants are really holding up well under the heat this year (so far, knock wood )

More Tomatoes — The second, and final, harvest for this week. Brings the total for the week to just over four dozen.

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The State of the Garden, 20-Augus-2013.

   Tomatoes are making a slow but sure comeback.
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Tomato harvest turning the corner — After three weeks of picking small, ugly tomatoes, they seem to have finally turned a corner. My best explanation is that the tomatoes I've been picking were a result of the heat bump in the last half of July, and the first week in August. Seems like there is a three-to-four week lag between the harvest and the weather that affects it.

Failed cucumber starts — My failed experiment with starting cucumbers inside. I planted 3 dozen (each in it's own egg-carton compartment). Only five sprouts came up, which I planted on these mounds. Of the five there is only one sprout left. That isn't enough for cross pollination, unfortunately.

Tomato plants improving — Since the weather has moderated, the tomato plants seem to be bouncing back.

Mellon Patch — The honey-dew patch seems to be doing well. Underneath that blanket of leaves, there are 13 melons, ranging in size from "large grape," to "small... well... melon." I place each one I can find on a small tile (as per Internet instructions) to keep it from getting ground rot.
Tag PhotoAdd Location

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The tomatoes are back, 18-September-2013.

   They took a while to recover, but they're going like gangbusters now.
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Never give up — Yields, quality, and size are retuning after about 4-5 weeks of small ugly tomatoes. This (foreground group) is yesterday's pick. I got another 40 today for another 3 dozen. There are still a few more out there that I'll need to pick, so the total yield for this week will be close to 7 dozen. THAT'S THREE PLANTS! Though there are still a lot of nice looking greens, there are fewer flowers now, so it may be winding down. We'll see.

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Late Season Garden, 18-September-2013.

   Don't let the ratty look fool you. It is still a VERY productive garden.
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I spoke with a first year gardening newbie the other day, who told me he had ripped out his garden because it had become overgrown and ratty. I'm on my third year. Still a newbie. But it seems like it may be a good time to share the uglier side of the garden.

Late season tomato plants (1 of 3) —

Here is a picture of my late season tomato plants. The foliage is yellow and brown in many places, even though I'm constantly picking those off the plant. There are also vines going every which way. It looks like a ratty mess.

The important thing to to understand, however, is that they are producing great tomatoes and fantastic yields.

It's true that for about a month following the July/August heat they were producing small, ugly tomatoes in smaller numbers, but THAT DID NOT MARK THE END of their useful season. When the more moderate temperatures returned, so did the quality and growth of the fruit (see 3 of 3).

The foliage continued to be ugly, but the harvests grew in yield and quality.

Late season honeydews (2 of 3) — Here's the honeydew patch. Notice the ratty, viney, yellowing foliage. Note the lovely honeydews too. There are 20 in the patch currently, of which I realistically expect to get 15-17.

Late season harvest (3 of 3) — As stated, even though the foliage looks horrible, the harvest continues to bounce back, producing high yields and good quality.

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The Freeze Prediction, 9-October-2013.

   Sadly, the growing season must end.
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It's sort-of sad and tragic to get the season-ending freeze report.

There are many ways to prepare green tomatoes — So many tomatoes were developing toward the goal of ripe maturity. There were lots of flowers too, looking for a bee. Oh well. There are good ways to utilize these greens. Someone has said they'd like to make fried green tomatoes. Someone else wants to make green salsa. Hoping they don't go bad like lasts year's last batch.

The remaining honeydew melons — Why do I suddenly feel like I'm on the cover of an old 10cc album?

The garden as a metaphor

In gardening, God provides something to which you can give, which gives back. You don't give just because it gives back food. You know, for example, there will be times when disease or disaster mean it will be able to provide little or nothing in return for your toil. It remains a blessing though, that you give and it gives back. It provides food, but also peace, and lessons about life, and how the creation is structured at the level of consciousness. It provides a reality check too, allowing you to understand, with indisputable certainty, just how much effort it really takes to sustain us. Even in the weeds there are lessons. The subtle ways—for example—in which they are able to establish themselves and thrive, employing their strategy of only taking.