Rain, rain, go away.

Well, not really. We need the rain. Our pond has been dry for some time. The cranes have come in and eaten all the fish and the poor ducks hardly have any water to swim in. We felt so bad for them, we brought them water in a large container. With this rain, I know they are happy again.

The gopher(s) have eaten many of the broccoli and cauliflower that we planted for ourselves this fall. We can’t wait to start growing in raised beds. We have also started to tear down old beds to build new.

Fall is a great time to start making your raised beds for spring planting. You can use wood, bricks, rocks, whatever you have to contain your soil. And start making compost too. Save your kitchen scraps, grass clippings and yard waste. Find free horse or cow manure. Mix it up, let it cook and you’ll have compost. Yes, there is more to it than that, but not much. It’s pretty simple and basic. Our goal this year, is to make our own compost. Purchasing it is not cheap and the transportation costs are as much as the compost. So making it will save money, reuse and recycle our own resources and reduce our carbon footprint by not shipping it to the farm. Go to Kitchen Gardeners.org and watch a video on making compost or check out Composting 101. The important thing is to start. We’ve even heard, in some counties, the garbage company will provide a composting bin free to their customers. Check it out and take advantage of the offer, if available.

Now is also the time to check out seed catalogs and purchase your seeds for spring. There are many seed companies out there but the most important factor, to us anyway, is to purchase from a company that honors the safe seed pledge. This pledge means the seed company will not knowingly sell seeds that have been genetically modified (GMO). Go to Gene Watch to learn about some seed companies and their websites. (Note: This list is about 2 years old, but you can check out the individual websites and double check…at least it’s a start.) Go to Say No to GMOs! to learn more about genetically modified organisms.

 

Are we sure this is Fall?

What about this weather? It’s the middle of November and I swear, it was in the mid-80’s at our house today. We started to work in the garden and it was so hot, I thought it was July again. Where’s the pool?

Today, Eric started building the next new raised bed and I cleared out some of the veggies in the first bed and in other areas of the garden. We attended a informal biodynamic gathering on Sunday where we met great people, ate wonderful food and learned a little more about biodynamic gardening. We had a great time! I am too new to biodynamics to even try to explain, but you can check out the Rudolf Steiner College for more info.

So the first raised bed will be cleared out and ready for new things, like potatoes. We’ll leave the chard for a while and see if it does any better. It has been attacked by leafhoppers, I think, so today, I cut them all down, hoping the new growth will come in better. I also covered them to prevent any more bugs and birds from eating them. Onions, garlic and probably more potatoes will be planted in the second bed.

We didn’t have a Fall/Winter season this year, because we need to rebuild the beds with raised beds, but we did plant some winter veggies for ourselves. Unfortunately, gophers and birds have done some damage to the broccoli and cauliflower. It will be so nice to have raised beds because then the varmits can’t get in and eat the plants. Plus it will be nicer to work in the Mel’s Mix.

We are also focusing on making all of our compost this year. It’s expensive, mostly due to the shipping, and we’d like to be self-sufficient in this area, and not rely on outside sources of compost. If we have to purchase it, we will, but our goal is to make enough each season. We have a couple of methods going now, so we’ll see which works best for us.

We also plan on teaching the Square Foot Gardening method. We just weren’t sure where or when and then my laptop crashed and it’s taken a while for me to recover. (Note: be careful what you plug your computer into. We have determined the electrical outlet at the school I am attending wasn’t safe and after some time, it fried my hard drive….not fun.)

 

Diggin In The Dirt

The weather is warming up. That means more time outside to play, garden and enjoy nature. Go out there and soak in the sun, breath in the fresh air and dig in the dirt. Many of you have your own kitchen garden and now is the time to get the soil ready and plant seeds.

COMPOST: Arrived on schedule on Tuesday. See Eric on top of our new mountain.

That’s a lot of compost, about 40 yards or 28 tons. We purchased it from Jepson Prairie Organics, <www.jepsonprairieorganics.com> out of Vacaville. We bought the Four Course®Compost, aged 3 years and is certified organic. It looks really nice and we are excited to have it. Now that it’s here, we will hill the potatoes and cover the asparagus. Many of you have asked us where to get compost. Check your local nursery, where you can purchase smaller amounts. We go to Front Yard Nursery <www.frontyardnursery.com> in Placerville on Mother Lode Drive.

POTATOES: Eric is so excited, as I’ve mentioned before, about the potatoe plants. I thought I should include a pic, so you can get excited too. We have 5 variety of potatoes: Red LaSalle, All Blue, Yukon Gold, Russet and Yellow Fin. Did you know the United Nations declared 2008 the International Year of the Potato? Their aim is to raise global awareness of the potato’s key role in agriculture, the economy and world food security. <www.potato2008.org>

EARWIG BAIT: We actually buy dark beer for the earwigs, although I think this case is going more to human consumption….he, he!! But really, last year we had so much earwig damage, we had to find an answer. Dark beer and dark soy sauce seems to be what they like. We host a pool party for the earwigs by laying out recycled Altoid boxes and fill them with beer. We did have some success last year, so we will try again this year. Right now, we have pools of beer and soy sauce in the carrot and beet rows.