Category: Heirloom and Organic Food

As I wrote in my prior posts on my April planting schedule and heirloom seed sources and potato planting and asparagus harvesting, I am following the Old Farmer’s Almanac Gardening 2008 Calendar this year. As a a relatively new vegetable gardener (most of my gardening experience is as a flower gardener), the Calendar is an indispensable help in knowing when to plant what.

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According to the Calender for my area in New Jersey (zone 6b), May is the time to plant the rest of the vegetables I have not yet planted. Here’s a summary of what I’ve done to date:

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Outside the perimeter of the Children’s Garden:
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*Asparagus – planted three years ago, the first harvest was two weeks ago, the second harvest was last week, and the third harvest will be in the coming week; I love perennial vegetables

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In the Raised Vegetables Beds:

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*Brocolli Rabe (pictured) – seedlings planted in early April were harvested last week and were delicious

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*Lettuce, Swiss Chard, Carrots, Leeks, Beets, Onions, and Sugar Snap Peas – also planted in early April, but not yet ready to harvest

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*Potatoes (pictured) – seed potatoes planted two weeks ago have already started to come up–I just bought the salt hay to cover them this week

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*Tomatoes, Zucchini, Cucumbers, Eggplant, Pumpkins, and Watermelon – some were planted last week, the rest will be planted this week

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*Corn – to be planted this week Native American-style with a piece of whole fish for each seedling–this is another great project with the kids, though you have to harvest all of the ears the minute they are ready before the critters get to them

Today, the Wall Street Journal featured an article and a video about individuals who have started to farm their own and their neighbors’ suburban lots for food. Kelly Spors writes:

“Since 2006, Mr. Nash, 31, has uprooted his backyard and the front or back yards of eight of his Boulder neighbors, turning them into minifarms growing tomatoes, bok choy, garlic and beets. Between May and September, he gives weekly bagfuls of fresh-picked vegetables and herbs to people here who have bought “shares” of his farming operation. Neighbors who lend their yards to the effort are paid in free produce and yard work.”

Last week, the New York Times also wrote an article about the less-extreme resurgence of kitchen gardens. Anne Raver writes:

“During World War I, to save fuel and labor, President Woodrow Wilson had sheep grazing on the White House lawn. His wife, Edith, planted vegetables to inspire the Liberty Garden campaign, in which thousands of students, called ‘Soldiers of the Soil,’ grew their own food in their schools and communities, she said. As the Allied powers began to win, the name Liberty Garden was changed to Victory Garden…Just after Pearl Harbor, Ms. Hayden-Smith said, another Victory Garden campaign was started. Eleanor Roosevelt grew peas and carrots on the White House lawn, and by the end of the war, Ms. Hayden-Smith said, ‘Americans were producing 40 percent of the country’s produce’ in their gardens’ (emphasis added).”

As a follow-up to my prior post about how to build raised vegetable beds, we are now organically preparing them for spring planting.

In the picture, the bed in the back is in the “before” stage and the bed in the front is in the “after” stage.

In the “before” stage, you can see that the box which was previously filled with compostable garden waste has settled about 6-12 inches over the winter. Some of the settling is due to the breaking down of the garden waste. The cover crop of winter rye was sown very late, in November I think. Over the winter it grew to about 6 inches tall.

In order to prepare the box for planting, I turned over the winter rye, then added bumper crop and top soil to re-fill up the box. Under this covering, the winter rye will decompose adding more organic material to improve the soil for growing vegetables.

Our vegetable plot is rather small for our family, but we hope through growing crops closely together that we will get some meals from the garden and a great learning experience for our children.

I just found out about Heirloom Gardener Magazine, which has no relation to this blog:

http://theheirloomgardener.com/

Based upon the website, it looks like a great magazine for heirloom gardeners, primarily focused on vegetables, which makes sense given that it is published by Baker Creed Heirloom Seeds:

http://www.rareseeds.com/

As you can probably tell by my blog to date, my garden is primarily a flower garden, with a small vegetable patch. That being said, the magazine does have some articles about heirloom flowers, so I have ordered some back issues to see if I want to subscribe.

There is a review of the magazine on the following blog:

http://davesgarden.com/products/gwd/c/2875/