peas and compost

I started the morning with the sun and birds at about 6am and worked the compost. The "black gold" pile had shrunk down to about 20 inches high from spring use. I scooped the remaining black gold out to prepare for turning and aeration of the "green" pile. I took 5 wheelbarrows of the black stuff to various places in the yard. Curiously as I got closer to the bottom of the black gold pile, the less broken down the compost looked. So I saved this stuff to layer into the green. Once empty, I removed the bin slats that separate the two piles and started pulling the green stuff over. As I pulled it over I did several things:

1. Chopped all the branches and sticks up as much as possible
2. pulled apart or chopped clods of dirt/sod
3. pulled apart and scattered dry brush and leaves
4. watered dry brush and leaves with compost tea
5. layered pile every 5 inches or so with partially finished compost
6. spread lime and green sand on top of each layer of partially finished compost

I was pleasantly surprised at the progress of this pile so far. While the whole pile was not exceptionally hot - there certainly were hot spots. This green pile only began on 2/27. Its composition was mostly cardboard boxes, dry weeds from strawberry wall, and sod from cherry tree garden. Not a whole lot of nitrogen had been introduced - mainly just kitchen scraps. It also hadn't been layered or chopped significantly. I fixed all that today. After all the work prepping the pile, I covered it with clear plastic for another attempt to heat it up and break it down. At the end of the day I dug about 6 inches deep and already felt the heat - Amazing.

I made some seed starter mix today. For about two weeks I have had a small pile of compost burning up out in the sun in a black concrete mixing bucket with a clear plastic lid. Today I made a 50/50 mix of that and peat moss and put it in a black plastic bag for future use. It looks pretty good. Hopefully it is sterile. That store bought seed starter mix is too darn expensive and skimpy on the quantity.

Sarah and I transplanted several perennials to the cherry tree garden - blue hosta, traditional hosta, mini-irises, lillies.

Most of the rhubarb that I planted a couple days ago looks basically dead. Sarah transplanted many of her perennials. She made me a list so I could keep the blog up to date - how sweet.

1. long row of cilantro in herb garden - burpee seeds 2 years old
2. transplanted dill in herb garden and planted dill seeds that we saved from last year
3. planted parsley seeds - ferry morse two years old. We added these seeds to the parsley patch that we had brought inside during the winter. Sarah transplanted these about a week ago and they look good.
4. Huge pot of cosmos seeds
5. more cilantro - this time in a pot with oregano and taragon
6. chamomile seeds in a pot
7. more cosmos - in garden near roses in two small plantings
8. transplanted two sunflowers to rose garden
9. Sarah did the window boxes today - two geraniums in each and trailing nasturtiums.
   

spinach in the sun garden is coming up well. I also filled in some blank spots in the sun garden with peas that did not take.

The photo is of the brussel sprout seeds that I started inside in my home-made seed starter.

4 am garden work

We are literally minutes away from spending a couple days in the hospital harvesting the baby seed we planted 9 months ago, so work has been heavy and sleep has been light. This morning I woke up (with a little help from Sarah) at 4 am. I decided to spend this cold, foggy morning in the garden. I started several seeds way too early. Now that we are supposedly past the last hard frost of the year, I decided to throw caution to the wind and plant some of these leggy, crummy seedlings and hope for a miracle.

1. Rhubarb - I planted about 10 of these. At one time about a month ago these were one of my indoor seed starting success stories. Now they are just barely alive. I put 4 in their permanent bed on the north west side of the house "blueberry garden". I hope that at least one survives. I planted the remaining 6 in a temporary location in the cherry tree garden - for future transplanting. NOTE FOR NEXT YEAR - I don't feel like looking it up now, but whenever I started these seeds this year was probably about 2 full months too early.
2. Sunflowers - We started these as seeds about three weeks ago as a church nursery project with the kids. They shot up fast. I have had a couple in pots outside for the last week or so, and while they aren't thriving (they are kind of leaning over), they aren't dead yet either. So I decided to plant the rest this morning. I put about 10 in the ground. I planted 7 at the base of our first wall along the alley. This section is historically a weed festival, but we have been trying to convert it to something at least manageable. We have transplanted lots of pacasandra, and dafadils over the last two years. We also have tried to get rhodadendron seedlings to take in this section with mixed success. I added these sunflower to the very front section hoping to add some sparkle to the folks driving up Center avenue. The three other sunflower I planted in the sun garden at the end of my garden paths.
3. Geraniums - much like the rhubarb, I was very proud of these geraniums about 2 months ago. Now they just make me sad to look at. I planted three of them next to the sunflower in the sun garden.
   

I also seeded a couple rows of buttercrunch lettuce this morning in the traditional cold frame. It has been a while since I have sowed lettuce.

This morning photos are of cold frame lettuce and brocolli and our asparagus patch. Mom if you are reading this - you will be eating some of this soon!

Third salad

Another salad for lunch today - 2 romaine, 3 spinach and some onion tops. All three of these veggies began inside and were planted in the sq foot garden cold frame. The salad was delicious. Now that a bunch of stuff is popping up, I am more willing to harvest my meager little seedlings.

What is doing well?

1. Beets in the planter are doing excellent. The beet leaves which I have harvested twice already, are big and vibrant. If I would have taken the time to check on them this afternoon, I certainly could have had a bigger salad.
   
2. Aspargus - We counted 21 spears poking up now. The largest is about 4 inches tall. I bet we will have our first aspargus harvest next weekend. They are growing about 4 inches a week.
   
3. Spinach - all over the garden little spinach seedlings are emerging. The seedlings that are planted in the cold frames are growing quite well and are about 8 leaves per plant.
4. Peas in the sun garden - These are popping up everywhere and very thick. These peas are kicking the holy crap out of the peas that I planted in the cold frame. Those are really spotty despite the fact that I planted about 100 of them, I bet only 20 seeds have emerged yet.

After my harvest, I replaced the lettuce and spinach with 4 small seed savers lettuce seedlings. These were started on 3/9. They aren't huge, but big enough to survive I hope. I also replaced a dead geranium in sq foot garden #2 with 4 swiss chard seedlings.

To Do List

It's Saturday and the weather is promising (30 degrees now - 51 high), so today will certainly spent digging in the dirt. It is too early right now to go out and wake up the neighborhood, so here is my to-do list for the day.

1. Build second sq. foot garden. The wood is cut, I just need to fit it together and fill it up with dirt.
2. Work soil in West half of sun garden. Make paths, add compost, remove green manure.
3. Plant potatoes. They came in the mail last week. I need to get them in the ground.
4. Prep soil in traditional cold frame, bring out various seedlings for hardening off - Pansys, mesculin pots, cabbage, brocolli flat
5. Plant various in cold frame and sq. foot garden #2.

I could say a million more things that are on my garden mind, but realistically I think that is all I can likely accomplish today. I'll check back this evening to see how I did.

End of day update: Well I actually did everything on this list - whopee!

Sq foot garden #2 was the first thing I worked on. It is 4ft by 6ft just like its brother. I conditioned the soil with bone meal, lime and compost. I planted all the squares but 7. Here is what I put in it.

1. Leek seed - one square
2. Spinach 18 seeds - two squares
3. Swiss chard - 9 seeds - one square
4. Seed saver lettuce - 5 seeds - one square
5. Beets - 18 seeds - two squares
6. Buttercrunch lettuce - 5 seeds - one square
7. Radish - 16 seeds - one square
8. Broccoli - 2 seeds - two squares
9. Carrots - 16 seeds - one square
10. Green onions - 16 seeds - one square
11. Red Cabbage - 2 seeds - two squares
12. Rhubarb seedling
13. Geranium seedling
    

The rhubarb seedling appeared to die almost immediately. Guess they aren't fans of cooler weather. I do not intend to cover this garden in plastic, since I didn't do many seedlings. I am fully prepared to lose the rhubarb and geranium.

Next project was in the sun garden. I also mixed bone meal in this section. I had previously mixed lime and compost. I created the main sunken path at approx 24 inches wide and one side path (north one). This gave me access to the north west raised bed for my potatoes. To prepared the soil, I took the dirt that I removed from the sunken path and threw it on top of the raised be area which had a smattering of green manure and compost laying on top. I worked it modestly with my fork and rake, but mostly just pulled large chunky stuff and green manure out with my hands. Then I dug 25 8 inch holes. I put the potatoe chunks in the bottom of the holes and buried them with about 2 inches of dirt. These were red norland potatoes from shumway. The plan is to continue to bury them as the sprouts break the surface. One book I read last night says I should spread one inch of chunky compost on top of them and then mulch them with apprx 6 inches of straw. I may do just that - if I can find straw around here. I am told to expect between 6 and 8 potatoes per plant, and that they can be eaten at almost any stage of maturity, since they are red.

The soil in the far west side of this section (grew corn and a fall planting of peas last year) looked absolutely wonderful. The rest of the soil was pretty rocky (from my paths last year), and had big sticks and chunks from my not so finished compost. But for the most part it looked nice and loamy. I did have to pull out another couple of concrete block chunks left over from the pond that I tore out last year.

Cold frame update: While I was prepping the soil in the sun garden, I transplanted 3 spinach plants that had survived the winter and are starting to green back up. I put them in the traditional cold frame and hit them with compost tea. I also watered everything that had previously been planted with compost tea. It is a nice light brown color coming out of the rain barrell. I wonder if I need to change the bag of compost at the bottom of the barrel from time to time.

Seed update: I saw a lot of new seedlings popping up today. SQ foot garden #1 now has the radishes growing in full force. I also saw two new spinach seedlings and one brocoli seedling popping up. I may have seen some buttercrunch lettuce popping up, but this may be a weed - still too soon to tell. In the traditional cold frame the spinach seeds are turning to seedlings, I saw some pak choi hit the surface, and I may have seen some kale. The geraniums I planted as seedlings in this cold frame about a week ago are certainly dead.

DEATH!

After surviving the last couple of nights with the outside temps in the single digits, the cold frames took some serious heat yesterday. The square foot garden frame took the brunt of it, reaching 90 degrees at 2 pm, when it was 55 and sunny outside. The other frame was already in the shade at that point and only registered 62. When it hit 90, Sarah removed the two ends to give it a little air. By the time I got home from work it was back in the 60s.

I spent some time in the garden after work, exposing the sq foot garden for the first time since I planted it about a week or so ago. As the headline to this post suggests, we had some death. The cabbage is the worst off. We lost at least 3 possibly 4 of the 6 cabbage seedlings. The lettuce also took a hit. One of the Seedlings ripped off when I was removing leaves. The spinach and onions look great. There was no sign of any seeds making their way to the surface. I will likely replant the dead squares this weekend. Question: What killed the cabbage? Was it the cold or the heat. I am guessing heat. The cabbage in frame #2 (only got to 62 degrees) looks just better, but still not beautiful.

The other frame didn't have any death. The stuff in there looks pretty good. It is possible that I saw one pak choi sprout, but that is as of yet unconfirmed. May be a weed. But something sprouted, which should be celebrated regardless of the plant.

I moved all the finished black gold compost to the sun garden, in anticipation of some serious compost reshuffling this weekend. The black gold looks ok - still pretty chunky, but plenty good enough to spread. The middle section of the compost bin needs a redesign. My little funky temporary center support to hold it together is not working as I hoped. I will have to screw a middle support permanently in place to hold it all together.

Early morning activity: My rowing plans were cancelled by some rough water, so I worked in the yard this morning. I planted 4 romaine seedlings in the sq foot garden to replace a dead cabbage. I replaced another dead cabbage with 16 radish seeds. Two other dead cabbage were replaced with Brocolli seeds. Two cabbage seedlings remain in the sq foot garden out of an orginal planting of 6. They are sickly looking, but may survive. I am willing to give them a couple more days.

In the back yard cold frame, I did the following:

1. Brought out Beet Planter and Carrot Planter, burried the pots a little in the dirt and surrounded them with leaves. It is mild (55 degrees) and cloudy today, so I thought they could start to harden off outside. I added one beet seed to this planter, which had a vacant spot.
2. Planted 4 geraniums.
3. Removed leaves from inside of cold frame, added good soil and planted 35 onion seedlings.

I left this cold frame with a 4 inch air gap at the top to allow for some air flow today. The sq foot garden, I left uncovered. I watered everything I planted today with compost tea.

On my way to work I hit Sandy Creek Supply for a 1/2 ton of mushroom manure and one cube of peat moss. It is amazing to me that peat moss costs almost as much as musroom manure. I probably shouldn't have bought it, but I do want to make my own seed starting mix for next year, so I need it at some point. I plan to add finely screened compost to it and put it in a black plastic bag to cook over the summer. Should be sterile seed starting mix for next year.