March 1st, time for Christianson’s 20% off bareroot sale! Sale started on Saturday which was a great excuse for an outing. The usual suspects gathered at the nursery for a day of fun. As usual, weather was awful, icey rain and cold wind, temps in the high 30’s. Downloaded some pdf files from the local universities on blueberry varieties to my Nexus which helped some, but it was still hard to make selections on the spot. I wound up with two bushes. One is Chandler, a big robust looking plant with a decent description and the other is Blueray, a very small and fragile plant, but the description sounded good. I’ll try to add the tagged descriptions later…
Last year’s bushes that still have tags are ‘Collins‘, medium to large size fruit, midseason and ‘Toro‘, large fruit and also midseason. Another has lost its tag and the last never had a tag, purchased already potted on close out at Cenex late summer.
Jayne purchased ‘Darrow‘ and ‘Burlington’ to add to her collection. Simone decided to defer for now.
I also purchased 2 bareroot asparagus plants ‘Mary Washington’ variety. They will be an experiment.
1st Cutting
July 3 mowed 1/3 (center) of field. Raked and baled after 5 days.
TOTAL 200 bales
2nd Cutting
Mow 2/3 of field August 4
Tedded August 6
Raked August 7
Stored August 10
TOTAL 530 bales
SEASON TOTAL 730 bales
1/2 gallon of Apple Cider Vinegar
1/4 c table salt
1/2 tsp Dawn liquid dish soap
Mix above ingredients in a spray bottle.
Spray weeds thoroughly.
1/2 gallon for around $6.40
Works better than Round Up – kills weeds on 1st application.
The Dawn dish soap strips the weed of its protective oils so the vinegar can work with deadly force. Safe for use in yards used by children and pets!!
This morning I noticed a barn swallow flying near the barn. What an exciting discovery, they’re back! By the end of the day there were many more, all swooping and chirping, happy to be home again.
The four apple trees we planted at TRMV in the early 90’s, going clockwise, are Jonagold, Akane, Summer Red and Chehalis. These trees have been overgrown by Poplar trees to the south, boxwood to the north, and cherry trees to the west. I am hoping to clean some of this out this year to allow for more light and hopefully improve their diminishing productivity. The following is some information I’ve been able to pick up about these varieties.
The Jonagold is a cross between a Golden Delicious and a Jonathan apple. Color is red and yellow. Its a good all-purpose apple, good for eating and cooking. Fruit keeps for 3 months in cold storage. The Jonagold has been called the finest dessert and eating apple. It is semisweet, full flavored and is crisp and juicy. The Jonagold is a mid season variety, apples ripen in mid Oct. This apple needs a polinizer but it does not polinize other varieties in return. Expect to see some scab. The tree will fruit annually.
The Akane, a cross between a Jonathan and Pearmaine, is an outstanding apple for both fresh eating and cooking. This is my most reliable apple. It always produces a good number of fruit. Apples are bright red in color with white flesh and are full-flavored, tart, and sprightly, with a “grapelike” flavor. Texture is firm and crisp. Its a great apple for organic orchards since it is resistant to scab and mildew and reliably bears fruit every year. It is considered an early to mid season variety, ripening from early to mid Sept. Akane needs a polinizer and is a good polinizer in return.
I don’t have much information about the Summer Red. It is a good polinator, bearing small red apples early in the season. Apples tend to be scabby.
The Chehalis is a lovely tree baring yellow-green skinned apples with white flesh. Fruit is sweet and juicy, good for both eating and cooking. It is considered an early to mid season variety, ripening mid August to late Sept. Chehalis needs a polinator and is a good polinator in return. An excellent organic apple as it is resistant to both scab and mildew. This variety is known to be highly productive, though that has not been the case here. I really like the flavor of this apple but it is a little soft and meally. It makes great applesauce.
Its been a bad summer for tomatoes. Temperatures have been cool and lots of rain and morning fog resulting in lots of leaf, no ripening and now fungal problems including black spot. Probably not a good year for evaluating varieties, however, I’m not very impressed with Roman Golden Wave. The tomatoes are small, grape-like and soft and mushey. They don’t seem to color much more than a yellow green. The shape of the fruit is attractive. It has a kind of teardrop shape with a sharp point at the end.
The plants in the greenhouse look the best. They’ve had to endure some incredibly hot daytime temps over 110 degrees but atleast they haven’t had the constant moisture. The Italian Heirloom has had some large, beautiful tomatoes. I’ve harvested five or six so far and they are very tasty, although a bit softer than I remembered from before. It took them a while to ripen, perhaps they are too ripe now.
I tried a new variety of cucumber this year. Simone gave me a Chelsey’s Prize seedling. It has grown very well in the greenhouse and I have harvested two large thin cucumbers so far this year. They were great! Just like the ones I’ve been purchasing at the grocery. Not all cukes have developed and matured. A large group on the same plant did not develop and turned brown while still very small. Will have to keep an eye on them and see what develops.
I did not grow, but taste tested another cucumber that Simone grows in her greenhouse that I enjoyed very much. Its called ‘Green Fingers.’ The cukes are intended to be harvested while small and the ones I tried were very crisp and tasty, no bitterness at all.
Both these varities were purchased from Renee’s Garden.
Tomato plants left the green house for the great outdoors first week of summer. They were planted, north to south along the sheep fence of the big garden in the following order: Arkansas Travelers, Sungold, Brandywine (Men’s Garden Club), Roman Golden Wave, Fir Tree, Zuchello, San Marzano, Stupice Heirloom, Crimson Carmelo, Fir Tree, Blondkoffchen, and Italian Heirloom.
I also planted the bell pepper starts I purchased at the Men’s Garden Club sale but they look pretty stunted already and may not recover.
The first day was just that, the first day of actually decent weather. It was a beautiful day in the mid 70’s, but was followed immediately by cool, wet weather.
