Thursday, April 2, 2009

Spring veggies now in the ground



I finally harvested a bunch of the remaining winter dinosaur kale, spinach, and arugula then pulled the remaining parts out and piled them on top of one our passive compost piles. I replaced those veggies with tomatoes, mostly.

Of the eight varieties of tomatoes I’m trying (Brandywine, Green Zebra, Cherokee Purple, Aunt Ruby's German Green, Beefsteak, Black Krim, Early Girl, and cherry Sugar Sweetie), six I started from seed.

This will be my first experiment in growing tomatoes from seed. Husband Kurt will be fashioning some sort of stakes/trellises for all of them soon, but for now they’re fine because most are still seedlings. I know, I know--I still need to weed and mulch.

I also planted more oregano, thyme, and basil and added some sage and three cucumbers. My jalapeno and scallion seedlings are still in paper cups in a window sill but should be ready to transplant within a few days.

I decided I don’t really like squash, okra, or eggplant enough to try to grow them myself, so I’ll just buy those from the great folks at Boggy Creek Farm.


west garden: last kale


west garden today


Green Zebra tomato seedling


east garden: last spinach and arugula


east garden today


Swallowtail caterpillar (I think) on the last of the dill

3 comments:

Flapjacks said...

fyi for the future, those kale plants will just keep going and going. very hearty stuff. congrats

TexasDeb said...

I'll second that. I have a couple of kale plants growing year round in the "ornamental" areas out back now just for fun. They seemed to tolerate even afternoon heat (although they do wilt a bit) in our dry dry summer last year.

I am so impressed with your wonderful garden. You better watch out or we'll all be standing at your doorstep hands outstretched for tomatoes. I haven't even gotten any in the ground yet. Oak allergies. I'll be one of those better late than never types I guess.

TexasDeb said...

Correction: I've got chard, not kale.

Hmm - guess that makes taking any advice from me a bit suspect, eh?