New Hankering

Uh oh... J's gonna kill me.

I read It's Not Work, It's Gardening! today and now I want a plumeria plant.


Apparently they're low maintenance, which is nice.
And the flowers are so pretty.
And they smell lovely.
And they can be grown in containers.
And now I have to find room at home for one...

Potatoes

When I first started out with the container garden, J was very upset that potatoes did not seem to be in his future. As a good midwestern boy, he loves him some potatoes and since moving to Boston and discovering Russo's, he's made it his mission to try every variety under the sun - and there are LOTS.

So you can imagine how excited he was when I read Stuckey and McGee's book and found a way to grow potatoes! Then again, that raised the problem of which type.

But he eventually settled on All Blues, and we placed the order and waited. In April we received a small paper bag of starter potatoes. We followed directions and put them in an egg carton and sprayed with a mix of water and liquid seaweed and let them sit.

When they sprouted long eyes we got out the trash can... Essentially this method consists of planting your seed potatoes near the bottom of the can and then filling it up over the plants as they grow. Since the potatoes aren't actually the roots, they're tubers, they grow off of shoots off the stem so you want to cover as much stem as possible to get more potatoes.


So far it's going really well! Our potatoes have really taken off - I had no idea they would grow so fast. It seems like every 4 days or so we have to go out and add more soil to the can. The photo below is a bit old, but as of today they're above the rim of the can. I'm not sure how much more soil we can add!
Can't wait for delicious potatoes from our own garden! And the plants are so pretty. I hope the flowers will be too.

Strawberries

What was that weather last night?! Luckily Boston didn't get any of the tornadoes that central Massachusetts saw, but I've never seen lightning like that before. There were the usual big bolts and cracks of thunder - some closer and louder than I've ever heard before, but the freaky part was the sky. It was constantly lit up with between-cloud lightning. Seriously, it was ALWAYS lit up. It felt like something out of a bad SyFy tv movie about weather.

But in other news, it's June! I always associate June with strawberries, so I'm really hoping my plants will give me some fruit. It's only their first year, so I won't be totally surprised if they don't though.

A million years ago (or so it seems) when we went to the greenhouse supply store I saw this container, and it looked like a good one for strawberries.
I've filled all three layers with strawberries, but with lavender in the center on top. So far they seem to like it. There's lots of new growth on the seedlings I bought.
And even a few blooms! I also started some from seed and I put them in the top layer to get some extra sun, but they're still pretty small. For some reason I didn't take any photos of those. I'll have to do that this weekend.I know strawberries are a popular fruit, does anyone have a favorite variety?

Containers

So this is a quick post. I really am going to get my stuff together one of these days and get my posts in a row.

But here are a few photos of some of the containers on the deck. I don't have a very wide variety of containers, but they all seem to be doing well.


These photos were taken about 2 weeks ago and it's amazing to see how small they were then in comparison.

We're scheduled to get some major storms today in Boston, but hopefully the weather west of here is better for my DAD'S BIRTHDAY! :)

Guess the Leaf

Last week I put up a post and had you guess the plant by its flower. In all honesty, they were pretty easy. Last weekend (seriously, where has this week gone!?) I was out in the garden and noticed how pretty the leaves of a lot of my plants are.
So let's try another guessing game. Guess the plant by its leaves! I'll post the answers tomorrow.
#1
#2
#3
#4
#5

The past few days here have been hot. Not just warm, but hot! I don't think my cool weather plants, like yesterday's kale, are loving it. But that just means now I get to eat them before it gets too hot and they bolt. Where did that term come from anyway? It seems so odd.

Lots of plans for the weekend. The place I work closes at 3pm on Fridays in the summer, and that starts this week and we have Monday off for Memorial Day... though I like to think we get the day off to honor my birthday, which is Sunday.

My garden is mostly planted for the year, but I promise to get some good photos of it. It's difficult because the deck is only so big and there's no place to stand and get a photo that isn't covered with a container filled with vegetables, or fruit.

I'll also attempt to get a photo of the garden I created here at work too!

Anyone have fun plans for the holiday weekend?

Plot of Land

Thanks for all the enthusiasm about the "plot of land" my landlord offered. I wish I was as enthusiastic as you. I may have oversold it in my last post.

It's about a 1' by 6'' piece of land shoved between two multi-story houses and a garage. I've been watching it the past few days at different times of day and the best sun situation is around noon when it gets the reflection off the neighboring house, which is technically just a reflection off the window of our house.

It's also interesting because further toward the street on this strip of land there's lots of hostas that seem to do pretty well, but they have quite a bit more sunshine.

Here's a photo. I didn't have time to take one, so this is from Google Earth. It must be from before we moved in, but there's plants on the deck, so the tenants before us must have gardened too! Do you see that tiny, very faint red circle I drew on the photo? Kind of in the dead center of the photo? Yeah, that's the "plot of land" he was so kind to offer.

And this gives you a better idea of how big our deck is. Ok, so deck might be stretching it. It's a glorified balcony. But we plan on filling it to the brim. :)

I'm hoping to take some more photos soon. It's been rather cool and rainy here. Not great for gardening and not great for working on my final exam - the rain just makes me sleepy.

Hope the weather is better for you all!

Noticeable

I was out this past weekend when our landlord stopped by to drop off a lease renewal. While he was here he mentioned to J that there's a tiny spot of land out by the garage that we can plant in if we'd like. He offered since he said "It seems you like gardening."

I can't imagine what might have given him that impression!

I think maybe people are starting to notice our ever-growing plant collection.

Dana's Porch is Falling Down...

The season hasn't even fully begun, but our porch is already getting crowded. J is worried that there won't be room to grill - GASP! We planted a few tomatoes, but it's still getting down to about 45 degrees at night, so we pull them into the house at night.
Between the in and the out and watering and soil moving and everything else, gardening is turning out to be a real workout! I can't imagine how it would be if I was doing more than just a few containers on my porch - scratch that, a LOT of containers on my porch.Our apartment is on the top floor of an older home, so I'm just hoping that our porch stays attached to the house all summer. And if it decides to make a break for it, I certainly hope we're not on it! :)

Reading Material

I've always loved to read. I spent a good portion of my childhood at the library and my mom is an elementary school librarian, so books were never hard to come by in our house.

Working full time and taking graduate level classes doesn't leave much time to read what I want to. I like the topics I read for class, but there's something less satisfying about reading when you have to do it.

Spring break was last week so I took the opportunity to procrastinate on all the coursework I had promised myself I'd complete and finally got to the pile of books I've had lying around from the library.

Actually, some of those I own, mainly the top four, but they're all good. I'll give you some mini reviews in case you're looking for some great new books to read over your "Spring Break".

The Bountiful Container - My new favorite book about container gardening. I actually got it from the library and loved it so much in the first skimming that I immediately bought it. Great advice, written in an easy to read way and some great art as well.

The second one down is actually a magazine called "Urban Farm." While a lot of their projects and ideas involve more space than I have, it's great for inspiration and I plan on keeping all the issues to pull out when I have a real yard one day.

The Vegetable Gardener's Container Bible - The other reviews online make it sound like a classic. I'm not sure it's that great, but it does give lots of good information about self-watering containers, something I think I'll try next year.

Four Seasons of Orchids - Gave me reassurance that I haven't killed my orchid and also informed me that I have a winter flowering orchid that needs more light (the guy who sold it to me in the student union somehow forgot to mention what type it was).

Canning and Preserving with Ashley English - I realize this is a bit premature since right now I just have seedlings, but I was curious to see if canning was something I could do myself and Ashley's book makes it seem absolutely within reach.

Teaming with Microbes - I'll be honest, I haven't really gotten into this one much yet. Lots of people have recommended it, but it seems to be really heavy on the science terminology and I'm having a hard time getting motivated. And now that Spring Break is past me I'm not sure reading this one will happen.

37 Houseplants Even YOU Can't Kill - Interesting enough. For the really simple basics of houseplant non-killing.

The Vegetable Gardener's Book of of Building Projects - My dad is incredibly talented when it comes to woodworking, and he helped me with a woodworking 4-H project years ago so this book reminded me of him. Great range of projects from really simple things I can do in an apartment (Coming Soon!) to bench swings and arches and bird boxes.

I got through those books so quickly that I headed back to the library and got more!

These I've mostly just skimmed to far.

Incredible Edibles - It's pretty basic and I definitely think there are better books about urban gardening.

The Girl's Guide to Growing Your Own - Still not really sure why this one's gender specific. I'm fairly certain men/boys could also use these tips - but to each their own.

Growing Tasty Tropical Plants - I AM IN LOVE. And J is terrified that our apartment is going to be taken over and turned into a very high rent greenhouse. That fear may not be totally unjustified... stay tuned.

5 Days Later

The seed packet days peas take 10-15 days to sprout.

I must have some seriously over-achieving peas.

It's only been five days!

Blueberries

Along with the seeds came my blueberry bushes. My parents have two in their garden and I have memories of going out in the morning to pick fresh blueberries for breakfast. Back then I wasn't the biggest fan of the taste of blueberries, but luckily my taste buds have evolved. Another impetus for buying some blueberry bushes is the cost of blueberries at the grocery store. Fresh or frozen those little blue antioxidant balls are wicked expensive!! I'm not made of money, but I'd like to enjoy blueberries.

When I was ordering seeds I noticed that Peaceful Valley also sold blueberry bushes and it seemed like a great opportunity. Since they flower and produce fruit, it's important to get two bushes, so they can cross pollinate. And it's also important to get two different varieties. So I went with a miniature variety called Tophat that's actually made for container gardening, and I also got a variety called Patriot. It seemed fitting since I live in Boston, and it's also a very common variety that produces lots of blueberries. High yield is fine by me!

The bushes arrived in little bags, as you can see from the previous post about their arrival. We'd been expecting them (I may have been a little neurotic and been tracking the shipment several times a day) so we'd already gone out and selected large pots and soil from Mahoney's here in Boston. The pots had to be very large since we're growing entire bushes, but not so large that we'd never be able to move them once they were filled with soil. We picked a basic potting soil with the understanding that we needed to keep it acidic.

Blueberries are masochists, a bit like grapes. If you give them rich soil with lots of nutrients they aren't going to produce very good blueberries. They like to have a hard time of it, with acidic soil, not too much water and they generally have fairly shallow root systems. The best way to organically keep the blueberry soil acidic is to include sawdust. As it decomposes, it lowers the pH level of the soil, keeping the blueberries happy.

So we planted the bluberries, spread some sawdust around the top and gave them a bit of water. We're keeping them in our sun room, which isn't heated so they can finish out the winter. They need the cold and dark to feel like they're outside, so they'll be ready to grow like weeds in the spring. I'm not sure we'll get berries this first year, but we'll take good care of them and hope for some.

Sowing Peas

Since the seeds arrived it was time to figure out when I needed to sow them indoors for them to be ready for outdoors. Some seeds can be directly sown outdoors in the pot, but others are needy and want some time inside with a grow light and heat pad.

I'm all about pampering my plants, so I headed to Amazon.com to pick out a grow light and heat lamp. I didn't want anything huge since I'm only growing enough for my patio, and I didn't want a light that would suck electricity like mad - don't need the cops showing up asking why my house is causing a spike in the electrical grid... "Officer, it's just tomatoes and peppers, I swear!"

We also got seed starter mix which is a lot lighter than potting soil so that tiny baby roots aren't suffocated. Yup, plants need air just as much as light and water!

Grow Great Grub had a table in the back to fill out based on the last frost in your area (for Boston it's generally considered to be around April 15th). Then you work backwards on how long the seeds take to germinate indoors, how long it will take them to grow to a good size indoors, and then when they can be put outside.

Most of the plants we're doing this summer can't be outside until after the last frost, so we aren't planting much for a while, but there is one plant that likes the cold. In fact, this plant will stop producing food once it gets too warm. Peas!!

Not surprisingly, pea seeds just look like dehydrated peas. Using the instructions on the back of the seed envelope I planted, watered, turned on the light and the heat pad and put on the top to create a greenhouse effect. It increases the humidity and warmth. Time to let the seeds work their magic.

Tomato Update 3

Tomato plant 1/16/11.



Tomato plant 1/30/11.




Tomato plant 2/5/11.

Seeeeeeds

They're here!! The seeds arrived so it's time for some sowing! Stay tuned...

Worms: Take 2

So the first worms are still alive, but I wanted the better worms. The red wigglers that would eat a pound of food a day and reproduce by the dozen. That would create boatloads of fresh, perfect castings that would make my garden this summer the best on the block. Not that there's a ton of competition on my Boston block, but I'm still competitive.


So this time I did my research. I found a website that provided lots of good information not just about the worms, but about how to vermicompost, how to care for the worms, how to use it - pretty much everything. The reviews were good, I checked several times to make sure they were the right kind of worm and then I placed the order.

The great thing about the internet is that you can buy pretty much anything. The terrible thing about the internet is that then you have to wait to get what you ordered. I'm not very patient. Somehow I muddled through the week and a half it too for them to arrive and I was definitely not disappointed. So many worms! So lively and red! So ready to eat food scraps! YAY!

They were well-packaged with shredded newspaper and a special sack to keep them safe in their journey from Kentucky. I added the newspaper to my worm bin and then opened the sack to see my new friends. I honestly couldn't believe how many there were! I more than got my money's worth this time. And they're the right kind of worm - ready to take my food scraps by storm and start pooing out some plant boosting compost.

It worked out well that J and I were making chili for dinner. We do a vegetarian chili with lots of good veggies. So while I was cutting it all up, I saved the scraps to give to the worms. They already seem acclimated to their new home and are busy at work composting.

I probably won't add any more food scraps this week. I'll take a look Thursday or Friday and take a photo to let you see how they've done. Go worms go!!

Uh-oh... Seed Catalog

The hydroponic experiment went so well we decided to venture into other food producing plants. I did some research on seed and seedling companies and finally went with Peaceful Valley out of California. Normally I’d prefer to buy from a more local company, but I was impressed with Peaceful Valley’s selection of organic and heirloom products, their customer service and their prices.

Seed catalogs are dangerous things for people looking into starting a garden. Especially in January with the snow coming down, the temperatures plummeting and some pretty serious cabin fever starting to set in. I tried to reign myself in, but I ended up buying a lot of seeds. Lots and lots of seeds. After ordering, came the long wait for them to arrive from California.

Researching

Things were going so well indoors that I had a crazy idea.

Since our new apartment has an outdoor patio, what if we put some plants out there? Not right now obviously - since the patio is currently buried under about 4 feet of snow - but in the Spring.

As a kid, we had a garden in the backyard that was just dug into the ground. My dad got ambitious and built raised beds one year, so then we had that. But neither of those systems would work on a patio.

I know flowers and herbs grow well in pots, but I'm greedy and I want vegetables and fruits. Would those grow in pots? Would the pots need to be so huge that it wouldn't be feasible? Can you only grow certain kinds of vegetables? So many questions!

A quick trip to the New England Mobile Book Fair (the best bookstore EVER!) yielded all the answers we needed via Grow Great Grub by Gayla Trail. (She also has a neat website.) This beautiful little book talks about the basics of growing food in small spaces, in the ground and in pots, as well as specifics about how to care for different kinds of food-producing plants and the pot size requirements.

The photos in her book hinted at great harvests and had recipe ideas. Now I'd jumped from looking forward to spring to looking forward to the end of summer! It was time to get started. I'd done my research. I'd conned my boyfriend into agreeing to this insane idea. Next up was buying seeds!!