A Lot Can Happen in a Couple of Weeks

    Welcome to the days of the Covid 19, or as Virginia says, "The Rona."  It may not hyperbole to call this a historical crossroad approaching the magnitude of the Great Crash or Pearl Harbor.  In the course of a month societal norms have been turned upside down.  We are in the middle of a modern day Pandemic.  To some it is the end of the world, to others it no big deal.  I tend to vacillate between the two extremes and settle toward the pragmatic middle.  Whatever comes of this Pandemic, I do not think life as we know it will be the same again.  I may be wrong.

    Virginia and I are both high risk candidates for the Rona.  We have pretty much settled in at the home place for the duration since March 14th, not a big change for us.  We have wandered out for pick up service at Walmart ~ what a blessing and convenience.  The same goes for prescription curbside pick up from our local pharmacy (a big shout out to a local pharmacy chain in Alabama, Mills Pharmacy).  Tractor Supply has announced curbside pickup as of March 31 so the chickens will not go hungry.  Fortunately, I have been able to work from home.  With that much time at the house, we have spent a good deal of time in the garden.

    I had planned on scaling the garden back a bit this year.  I found some information on organic amendments from Steve Solomon's book, The Intelligent Gardener.  I had everything ready in mid February to apply to around 4000 square feet of garden.  I was planning on a semi intensive approach to plant spacing.  I have stuck to that plan for the most part; however, I have taken a very aggressive approach to the garden this year and added additional areas I had not planned on gardening originally. (so far I have not dug the drive way up yet).  My garden is no longer a hobby garden.  I am unsure of the supply of fruits and vegetables I will be able to get this year.  In addition, I am not at all comfortable with food that other people have handled during this health crisis.  So here is the first post with what is going on with the back garden.  I have pretty much finished planting it in the last day or so.  This may be overkill on our part; however, I do want to see what I can do when the garden is approached as a serious enterprise.  We may have more than we know what to do with. So much the better.  We can find good homes for the produce.  If not we know a good local food pantry that can use it.
    

Without further ado, welcome to the 2020 Back "Rona" Garden.

Potato patch (back) and Tomato patch

I had reduced the size of the potato patch by about a quarter this year.  I regret that decision but it is a bit late in Alabama to play catch up.  The two raised beds in front of the potatoes are my tomatoes.  I reduced the size of their beds this year.  Fortunately, having plenty of seed, I was able to add some more plants in a part of the yard I had not planned on gardening.

Grape Tomatoes planted in front left bed  and the bed in front of my chair,

Every Redneck needs a Watermelon patch and Cherry Tomatoes growing in an old tire!

That is a taste of things to come in the 2020 Back "Rona" Garden. I will try to post more regularly this year.

Back in the Saddle. It has been a while. Life gets complicated some days, or some years. Enough said about that for now. I am back. I hope to have a bit more to contribute going forward. I am hoping to be able to talk about my gardens in the front and back yard. It is my deepest desire to share what is going on with the spiritual garden as well. Stay tuned.

Wood chips, compost, and compost tea. Oh My!

We are gardening in the middle of Alabama. Like it or not, our soil is a heavy clay soil that compacts into a hard brittle soil.
 

Here is what our soil looks like uncovered.

    Up until this year I have battled this soil with a rotor tiller.  She has been a good tiller for the last nine years. I have spent many hours behind her. But this year I tried something totally different. I broke down and ordered a Treadlite Broadfork. I was skeptical when it arrived. And it was a challenge on the hardened clay soil. I have since learned that it works much better to use when my soil is wet. I can drive the broadfork deeper when the soil has some moisture.

My new baby.

This approach allowed me to greatly reduce my tilling. I still continued to use the tiller for some jobs for a while. But that is another story.


    Many years ago, I read Dick Raymond's gardening books. I walked away with an understanding of the importance of mulch for a garden. I have tried buying hay, scavenging bags of leaves off of the side of the road, Lasagna Gardening with cardboard and scrap paper, all with limited success. 

    I read David the Good's (yes that is how he refers to himself) book,
 Compost Everything: The Good Guide to Extreme Composting

     One of the things you realize in reading David's book is that there is no such thing as enough compost or mulch. He has an interesting alternative to stretch your compost. It is his own compost tea, swamp juice, or that nasty smelling 55 gallon drum at the edge of the garden. Here is the link to his video about his compost tea. 

That which should not be disturbed.

    David's approach is an anaerobic compost tea. You toss in greens, browns, water, urine, any thing not banned by the EPA mainly. You cover it securely. This is an important step. The lid I originally used did not fit as snugly as my current one. I think a new fly mutation has developed in there. Any way, I initially placed some around my early tomatoes in the back and the main tomato crop in the front. (They are doing quite well I might add. Details coming in a future post.) As life gets crazy, special projects fall by the way side. Until today.
 

Oh My, My, My!!!

I celebrated the 4th of July by emptying the swamp juice. 
 

The sludge was placed around the latest corn crop.

 

  
  I used the liquid to fertilize most of the newcomers in the front garden as well as the sweet potatoes in the back garden. I will update you on the results. The aroma of the front garden dwarfed the chicken pen today. Fortunately, I had a shower and the garden got a good shower.

    I had watched the Back To Eden film a couple of years back and was intrigued by it. Basically, he recommends initially throwing loads of labor into placing around eight inches of wood chips over your soil and and not tilling it any more. I had reservations because of what I had heard others say. Many rightly stated that working wood chips into the soil would cause a short term depletion of nitrogen as the wood chips were broken down.  I revisited the film this year and some others that discussed the Back to Eden method. It seemed that what I missed originally was that the wood chips were not tilled into the soil or planted in. They were simply a compost/mulch layer. 

    At this point, I was game to try it. There is just one problem. We live a ways out from the city. There are no tree service companies that drive by our area. I proceeded to attempt to find someone who would be willing to bring us some wood chips. That task turned out to be a lot harder than I had expected. But then, we stumbled on a tree crew from Florida that was trimming trees for the power company in Leeds. Before I knew it, I had three truck loads of wood chips dumped on my property. 

Manna for the garden.

    After some 100-150 wheel barrow loads, I now have 2-4 inches of mulch over all of my gardens. I still have one load of mulch laying out there to spread. I could use some more but that is a great start. 

Here is what my garden looks like these days.

It is so nice to begin to take control of your garden back. Usually by July, the heat and the weeds have taken me out of the game and it is time to dream of next year. Not this year. Second plantings are happening. The tomatoes and peppers are coming on strong. The pole beans are winding down after canning 40-50 pints. The pole butter beans are just beginning. Southern cowpeas will be in season soon. This has been a good year with consistent rainfall. I have actually pulled off winter squash this year that are about ready to harvest. I followed David the Good's recommendation and planted Seminole Pumpkins on the back hill. They are growing gangbusters so far. One day they may think about producing fruit when they have conquered the greater part of St. Clair county. I started another one in the front garden this week. 

    Anyway, my garden is not finished for the year. I usually get burned out and give up on a Fall garden. Not this year. All it takes is a little effort each day or so. I hope you continue to persevere in your gardens as well.

MM






 

Seminole Pumpkins and the bees

Just a quick post: 

Precious Virginia stumbled on these pictures while hanging out clothes today. She was carefully avoiding becoming entangled by the encroaching pumpkin when she noticed black circles in the blooms.

  

The bees love these plants.

 You should see them trying to fly away!

Seminole Pumpkins, the Kudzu of the Vegetable Garden

Recently David the Good posted an interview about his new thriller Turned Earth, A Jack Broccoli Novel. In it he talks about his love of pumpkins and the danger they pose. It took me back to a post that Precious Virginia made back in 2014. But before we go there. I have taken David's bait and planted some of the Seminole Pumpkins he raves about. We are beginning to have fruit, but the vines are already 20-25 feet in both directions. I tried to train them down the hill at the back of the garden. They proceeded to turn around and grow back up the hill. In the other direction, they are approaching the house already.

So innocent looking

Keep Moving. Nothing to see here.

Underneath the clothesline.

Somebody warn the neighbors. The pumpkins are coming. The pumpkins are coming.

Without further ado, here is what Precious Virginia posted way back in 2014.

Some of our vegetables are getting a little scary.

I think they are trying to take over.

The squash are at least semi-polite about it.

At least this one gave us fair warning when it ate the solar light.

It never went further than the other side of the sidewalk.

(Which makes me have to ask, "Why did the squash cross the sidewalk??")

It gives a LOT of squash to compensate.  I already have 24 bags in the freezer and we have been feasting on it a couple of times a week.

But the cucumber does not have the same politeness.

 It just comes right on into the basement 

 

and makes itself at home

Without even bothering to knock!

Major Fail: Pet food for fertilizer.

Who knew cat food would prove fatal for this Opossum?

I recently read an interesting article about using pet food for fertilizer, by David the Good. I found it interesting. We had some dry cat food that was bad, so I thought, let's put this to good use. I had a pumpkin plant that I placed it around. It seemed like such a harmless act on my part. The night before last, I caught sight of an opossum(possum to most of my people) late at night. He disappeared before I could properly counsel and deal with him. Last night around midnight the outside light was on and one of the cats indicated not all was right outside. I proceeded out and found him stuffing my cat food fertilizer in his mouth. I was prepared to properly counsel him this time. He did not receive my "counsel" well. I am sad to say this proved fatal to the poor creature. He died before he knew what happened. I guess you can call this reason .22 that you should not use pet food for fertilizer. It can prove fatal to the poor possums. As he thrashed about in his last moments he almost killed my pumpkin plant. Now that would have been a real shame. You just never know what you will find when you spend more time in your garden.

MM

Tillers, Broadforks, and Compost, OH MY!!

    We are gardening in the middle of Alabama. Like it or not, our soil is a heavy clay soil that compacts into a hard brittle soil.

Here is what our soil looks like uncovered.

    Up until this year I have battled this soil with a rotor tiller.  She has been a good tiller for the last nine years. I have spent many hours behind her. But this year I tried something totally different. I broke down and ordered a Treadlite Broadfork. I was skeptical when it arrived. And it was a challenge on the hardened clay soil. I have since learned that unlike the tiller, it works much better when my soil is wet; I can drive the broadfork deeper when the soil has some moisture. I have fallen in love with this tool. I never dreamed I could loosen my clay soil this effectively. WOW!

My new baby.

    This approach allowed me to greatly reduce my tilling. I still continued to use the tiller for some jobs for a while. But that is another story.

    Many years ago, I read Dick Raymond's gardening books. I walked away with an understanding of the importance of mulch for a garden. I have tried buying hay, scavenging bags of leaves off of the side of the road, Lasagna Gardening with cardboard and scrap paper, all with limited success. This year I realized that I had a wealth of leaves lying under some three acres of trees. I proceeded to drag the leaves up to the gardens. I managed to create a light leaf mulch over most of the garden. But dragging a tarp loaded with leaves up a hill over and over and over again gets old in a hurry.

    I had read David the Good's (yes that is how he refers to himself) book,
 Compost Everything: The Good Guide to Extreme Composting

     One of the things you realize in reading David's book is that there is no such thing as enough compost or mulch. He has an interesting alternative to stretch your compost. It is his own compost tea, swamp juice, or that nasty smelling 55 gallon drum at the edge of the garden, as Precious Virginia thinks of it. Here is the link to his video about his compost tea. 

That which should must not be disturbed.

    David's approach is an anaerobic compost tea. You toss in greens, browns, water, urine; any thing not banned by the EPA mainly. When he named his book, Compost Everything, he was not kidding. You are instructed to cover it securely. This is an important step. The lid I originally used did not fit as snugly as my current one. I think a new mutant-strain of fly has developed in there; they certainly have been prolific. 

Any way, several months ago I placed some around my early tomatoes in the back and the main tomato crop in the front. (They are doing quite well I might add. Details coming in a future post). As life gets crazy, special projects fall by the way side. Until the 4th of July.

Oh My, My, My!!!

    I celebrated the 4th of July by emptying the swamp juice.  Yes we do celebrate things a little differently in my neck of the woods.

The sludge was placed around the latest corn crop.

Castor Bean

 

Giant Dill Pumpkin.

  
    I used the liquid to fertilize most of the newcomers in the front garden as well as the sweet potatoes in the back garden. I will update you on the results. The foul odor of the front garden dwarfed the fowl odor of the chicken pen that day. Fortunately, I had a shower and the garden had a good rain shower.

    The leaf mulch I hauled in to the gardens was a great start. But it still seemed insufficient for my garden needs. The weeds still seemed in control and a good dry stretch of weather would take its toll. I needed to take it to the next level. What could I do for my poor garden? Stay tuned.

  

Successes and Failures-Safety Third

 I am going to be posting about the successes and failures in the gardens as on ongoing theme. Everyone who gardens will not have one without the other. At least that has been my experience. But remember that failures and successes do not define who you are. Who you are is determined by what you do with your successes and failures. There is much to learn from both your failures and your successes. Most of these posts will be about the garden. But when I came across this picture, I had to start with a more personal one.

You can teach an old coot new tricks!

I spent 59 years without using safety glasses. I was rather proud of that fact. The only minor complication was an occasional piece of trash in the eye that healed in a short time. That was until two years ago.

I was building this chicken tractor. Yes. We have chickens. 

Anyway, where was I? I was building this tractor. I had the grinder, from the first picture, in my hand. As usual, I had no eye protection. After all, eye protection was for sissies. Then the unexpected happened.

A small sliver of rusty tin buried itself in my right eye. Initially I thought I just had a bit of trash in my eye. Things went down hill from there. Fortunately, we have the Callahan Eye Clinic in Birmingham. They were able to get me in to see Dr. John Parker the next morning. My first experience with Dr. Parker was not a pleasant one. He had the tweezers and I was trying to keep my head absolutely still while he removed the sliver from my eye. But here is where God's providence came in. Dr. Parker is one of the best cornea doctors around. My vision had been diminishing over the previous years. He was able to look at my eyes and see the cataracts that were developing and even take some baseline images of my eyes for reference if I had cataract surgery. I have now had both eyes corrected by him. It has been a blessing to get to know him professionally and as a brother in Christ.
 
There are several lessons here in this failure and success. To begin with, make it a priority to wear eye protection when using power tools. Dr. Parker is even suggesting that I wear a hat to prevent macular degeneration at my age. That one is a tough habit to form, but I am working on it. The second lesson is, do not let Precious Virginia catch Marvelous Mark using power tools without eye protection any more. Enough said on that one. The third lesson is that God is at work even in our "failures." He can work to redeem a knucklehead putting a piece of metal in his own eye. What can he do in your life? Think about it.

MM

Welcome to our trellis garden

Welcome to our home. 

Here is a picture of the walkway coming up to the front of our home. Those are Fortex French Filet pole beans on this end. These are some of the best beans I have ever tasted, totally string less. We have canned enough for the year already.  They are about finished producing, but we are hoping to save some seed. The seed are a bit costly on the web.

The view from the other end.The section closest to you are the yard long pole beans. They are fair eating but mostly a novelty. Just past them are the Willow Leaf pole butter bean, or Lima bean depending on where you are from. They are a small seeded variety and very tasty. They are about to start coming on.

A close up of the "Yard Long" beans.

A porch with a view.

A glimpse of our walkway when the sun goes down.

                               


























MM