Gardeners: how are your gardens doing?

[88GT]

and some canning work! damn I need a partner lol. wife and the little one left me to go get some sleep!

I hear ya. If I don't get to do it on the weekends, I don't get started until 7 or so in the evening. I'm usually waiting to hear the lids pop down around 2 or 3 in the morning.

 

[CountryBoy19]

Made pepper jelly this weekend. Not quite as hot as I'd like. I think I'll add more hot peppers next time.

Canned more beans. Up to 20+ qts last week. Could have been another 5 but I decided to send some with my mom, probably can some more tomorrow.

First tomato turning red now.

And a bonus, finally harvested some honey. But honey harvest didn't go as seemless as I had hoped. Not near as much capped honey as I expected. It has to be this warm, humid weather making it the bees slower to cap the honey (they only cap it after the moisture content is dry enough to not spoil and it takes time to dry the honey down when it's humid). Other factors resulted in a big combination of less than a gallon of honey harvested and a TON of very, very angry bees. But I only got stung through the bee-suit once, which is pretty good for as angry as they were.

 

[hooky]

Got about 20 lbs of turnips out of the ground and few pounds of beets on Sunday. Planted more turnips for the greens this time, brussel sprouts and some beans. We ate our first peaches of the year this weekend too. Will probably be canning peaches this weekend or mid next week.

 

[grunt soldier]

garlic anyone first 50 bulbs. they seemed to die before the rest for some reason but still some great sized bulbs. this is purple Italian. got siberian and bogatyr for my spicy varieties. I'm thinking I'll dig the rest up this weekend and start drying them.

 

[BigMatt]

Well, the sweet corn ended up great. We are still picking, but the bigger ears are getting a little starchy. The goats and chickens are loving the old ears. Late ears are still great eating. I am bringing about 30 dozen in to work every day for my employees.

We have picked about 500 dozen so far and are about half way there. My uncle froze about 60 quart bags and we are eating so much, we are pooping every 5 minutes. I never thought I would say it, but I am getting sick of sweet corn!

There is no way we will get all of this corn picked. The birds are loving it though.

The pumpkins are starting to come on. We have about 20 or so that are softball sized and the bees are going crazy. We need to start hoeing and fertilizing. They should be just right for Halloween. I am hoping to end up with 3-400 pumpkins.

 

[hooky]

Headed north this weekend to do sweetcorn. Dad plants 4 rows on the edge of a field so most of it's ready within the same week, and it's ready. Between my folks, my 2 brothers and me, around 250-300 pints will be frozen this weekend.

The grandkids thought it was a lot more fun when they were little and didn't have to pick, shuck or clean.

 

[CountryBoy19]

garlic anyone first 50 bulbs. they seemed to die before the rest for some reason but still some great sized bulbs. this is purple Italian. got siberian and bogatyr for my spicy varieties. I'm thinking I'll dig the rest up this weekend and start drying them.

I don't mean to be rude, but it looks like you let it go a bit too long... supposed to harvest after 1/3 of the leaves turn brown but definitely before 1/2 of the leaves are brown then hang in a cool, dark place to dry/cure...



And I'm officially jealous of all the people with corn ready...

 

[BigBoxaJunk]

And a bonus, finally harvested some honey. But honey harvest didn't go as seemless as I had hoped. Not near as much capped honey as I expected. It has to be this warm, humid weather making it the bees slower to cap the honey (they only cap it after the moisture content is dry enough to not spoil and it takes time to dry the honey down when it's humid). Other factors resulted in a big combination of less than a gallon of honey harvested and a TON of very, very angry bees. But I only got stung through the bee-suit once, which is pretty good for as angry as they were.

I pulled off honey supers yesterday too and I was surprised to see a good bit of uncapped honey on both of my hives. You're probably right about the humidity. I did get two good full medium supers. Strained out to over 4 gallons. I had bought one of those plastic strainer/ bucket combos from Dadent. The bucket has a honey gate that makes bottling so much easier.

 

[CountryBoy19]

I pulled off honey supers yesterday too and I was surprised to see a good bit of uncapped honey on both of my hives. You're probably right about the humidity. I did get two good full medium supers. Strained out to over 4 gallons. I had bought one of those plastic strainer/ bucket combos from Dadent. The bucket has a honey gate that makes bottling so much easier.

Do you crush and strain your honey or do you have an extractor?

I have top-bar hives and I do crush and strain but I'm just not satisfied with the honey production out of them. I get about a gallon of honey from each hive per year. I'm always jealous when I hear about people getting 4-5 gallons from a single hive every year... I've considered switching to Langstroth equipment but it's pretty expensive so I've held off for now...

 

[BigBoxaJunk]

Do you crush and strain your honey or do you have an extractor?

I have top-bar hives and I do crush and strain but I'm just not satisfied with the honey production out of them. I get about a gallon of honey from each hive per year. I'm always jealous when I hear about people getting 4-5 gallons from a single hive every year... I've considered switching to Langstroth equipment but it's pretty expensive so I've held off for now...

I will likely get over 5 gallons from one of my two hives this year, and probably more like two from the other. That is more, I think, than I've ever gotten in many years of beekeeping. My normal is much less. Some years, I've not gotten any, if I let them swarm, or if I do a poorly timed split, or a poorly timed split and then also have them swarm.

The results I got this year started last year when I started with two young queens and concentrated on letting both hives build up before winter. I didn't take any honey off last year, but I did take off a full medium super early this spring when I saw that one hive had it to spare. I worked at it starting early this spring, making sure that they had room to expand and cutting out swarm cells in the one hive that built up quicker (that's the one that produced the most).

And, yes, I crush and strain, but I also keep some of the nicer sections of comb honey, since I know some people who really like it. The new bucket/strainer thing that I bought has worked out pretty nice.

I've gotten some really helpful information at: bushfarms.com/bees

 

[draftsman]

Blackberries staring to ripen, been picking cherry and grape tomatoes for a couple weeks and finally a regular tomato yesterday. I've been picking salad greens and cucumbers for a while. Apples getting big and raspberries too.

 

[grunt soldier]

Yes they went a bit to long but they are hanging now. they all look good and still intact. no problems at all so far. I guess we will wait and see

 

[longbow]

I let it go wild this year since the wife can't help.

The wild berries and the strawberries are doing just fine. We have gone to a locals farmers market to get what we need and she can get out of the house.

Some of the squash and watermelon have grown back from a few rejects I left from last year.

 

[LEaSH]

Rapini keeps producing and we've been eating it nearly every day. Trying not to let it go to seed.
So good. Just a little garlic and olive oil tossed on some pasta. Need to see if it will freeze well enough to keep.

 

[Manatee]

My son and a good friend of his developed an app: GardenBilder Garden Bilder - Download the app now on the App Store - Made for iPhone. It just recently won an award here in Indy and one in California. It is presently free for the iPhone. They are in development of the app for the iPad and then on to the world of non-Apple.

It will run on your Mac, but size may be off a bit. I'm not a gardener, but it's being downloaded by a lot of folks.

 

[copperhead-1911]

Just curious.

I am new to prepping at home ( not field manuevers), but what are the easiest things to raise that takes the least room? I was told tomatoes are a definite and I could grow them in a coffee can

Thoughs?

 

[LEaSH]

Just curious.

I am new to prepping at home ( not field manuevers), but what are the easiest things to raise that takes the least room? I was told tomatoes are a definite and I could grow them in a coffee can

Thoughs?

Tomatoes are pretty easy and fun. Try lots of different things in containers. Beans, peas, lettuce, etc.

Potatoes are easy. Civilizations were dependent on them for centuries.

Try the container methods you might find on youtube. People grow them in bags, too.

They are easy to store over winter if you get a good thick skin variety. replant what you dont eat and you could have potatoes for a very long time.

 

[CountryBoy19]

Just curious.

I am new to prepping at home ( not field manuevers), but what are the easiest things to raise that takes the least room? I was told tomatoes are a definite and I could grow them in a coffee can

Thoughs?

T
Tomatos are definitely not low-space, but very worthwhile. I have not had good luck container growing them. Planted in even crummy soil I've had them get oveer 6 feet tall. The key is proper nutrition and proper staking/caging.

Low space, hgher yield crops would include pole-beans for sure. I planted approx 50 foot row along the fence that keeps the chickens out of the garden and we've been canning like crazy. Potatoes take up a lot of space as well but they yield good too. I just dug minee yesterday and ended up with 6 full 5 gallon buckets. 3 of those came from 1/4 of my potatoes (red pontiac variety). Carrots, strawberries (done right), garlic, herbs are all low-space crops.

Lettuc is a good one if you like salad. It tends to bolt in the summer; it only likes cool weather so plant early, enjoy it until later May or June and then back-seed something in its place Ways to make up for lack of space is to stagger crop planting so as you harvest one you plant another. I will plant carrots in place of potatoes I just harvested. Lettuce will be planted again this fall as well as garlic.

 

[GLOCKMAN23C]

My first decent sized harvest this year. I hope it taste as good as it looks!

1.75 gal greenbeans
15 or so tomatoes
6 various peppers





I'm ready for some salsa.....

 

[88GT]

Some of the squash and watermelon have grown back from a few rejects I left from last year.

So funny (funny interesting and kind of funny ha-ha) how resilient and self-sustaining they can be. I have 2 tomato plants and an eggplant plant (too much?!? ) growing on the margins of my compost pile. One of the tomatoes is flowering. I'm leaving it to see what it does.

Just curious.

I am new to prepping at home ( not field manuevers), but what are the easiest things to raise that takes the least room? I was told tomatoes are a definite and I could grow them in a coffee can

Thoughs?

A coffee can would be insufficient space for the root system, but tomatoes are fairly easy to grow. There's an entire cottage industry devoted to container gardening (the solution to low- and no-space gardening). Just about anything that doesn't spread horizontally can be grown in a container. (And even some of those can be trellised as a cheat.) I can't think of much in a typical row/bed garden that can't be duplicated in a container garden, provided the container is of sufficient size for the plant and doesn't create unfavorable microclimates (i.e. concrete containers exposed to direct sun for 14 hours a day will likely bake whatever you put in there to a literal death). Except for corn. (Though having said that, I saw on the cover of one of the seed catalogs a new variety of corn developed for container gardeners. Who knew?) The bramble berries might be another exception. The question you should be asking is what do you want to grow.