Author Archives: Jim

About Jim

I'm a certified square foot gardening instructor that enjoys teaching others how to grow their own great, healthy, organic food. I also enjoy cooking, biking, playing my guitar, reading, and card magic.

Winter gardening

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let it snowI’ve just finished reading a great book on winter gardening(thanks Brynn!)by Eliot Coleman.  The basic premise is this: most of the United States is south of the 44th parallel.  If you were to look at where this is you’ll see that the majority of Europe is further north than we are in the U.S.  But in Europe gardening doesn’t stop in winter-it’s traditionally carried right on through.  Yet in the U.S., at least in the more difficult to grow climates(zone 6 and below), it’s our tradition to close the gardens down in the winter.  Why fight the weather?  In this book the author lists between 20 and 30 vegetables and produce items that can easily be grown in cold weather.  In fact, the things that he’s grown only do well in cold temperatures.  In France, unheated greenhouses are used to grow all of these items because it keeps the wind off the plants and can add another 10-15 degrees to the outside temperature and maybe even more.  It was a fascinating read.  What he does is plant in late October(Maine-zone5).  By the time everything grows and it’s time to start harvesting he and his wife are able to eat all winter long right out of the garden.  The key was to have it planted before the harsh weather hits.  He uses winter to harvest, not to plant.  He also takes time to discuss building a cold frame and low tunnels.  By using these you get the equivalent of moving up 1 to 1 1/2 zones.  So if your typically in zone 5 and protect your gardens with low/high tunnels, you just became the equivalent of zone 6 to 6 1/2.  This changes things significantly.  I got to thinking-I’ve got low tunnels and cold frames that I’ve used for years.  Mine aren’t nearly as expensive as Elliot’s but they accomplish the same thing.  So I’m starting right now.  I’ve got the tunnels on my two main square foot garden beds.  In a few days my garden should be ready to start planting.  I’ll be planting in winter vs. harvesting in winter which might be different.  This is the earliest I’ve ever started and I’m anxious to see how the experiment turns out.  Can you imagine over 20 different things to harvest in the months of December through March in most of these colder zones?  Wow.  I’m going to be doing that next year too.

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Brussel sprouts

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uncoverd brussel sproutsHere’s a little something for you snow SFG’ers.  Toward the end of this past years growing season I wanted to plant brussel sprouts.  I purposely waited until later because I’ve had so much trouble growing it in the spring and summer.  The problem in the past has been the white butterfly. So I thought to myself, why don’t I grow these later in the year when the white butterfly is gone?  It’s kind of the same strategy some people use with squash-they’ll plant squash a little later-after the threat of squash bugs has past.  I like that thinking but in shorter season climates such as we have, it might not give you enough time to grow your squash.  Right off the top of my head I don’t remember when I planted this but it  was sometime in late July I think.  I was hoping to get this growing and established for a winter crop and I was planning on protecting it through the winter.  Knowing that these little nuggets taste better after a frost, my goal was to get the plant big enough and established in time before the real hard winter weather got here.  I don’t think I made it.  But I didn’t want to just pull it up and throw it out.  So I’ve decided to keep it going and see what happens.  I’ll still cover it in bad weather.  I actually has grown some-though very slowly.  We’ve had 6-8 inches of snow this past week, with another 5-10 inches coming tonight.  I’ll cover it today to keep the weight of that snow off the plant.  I don’t know what this will look like going forward.  I’ve read that brussel sprouts can go into a dormant stage and then start growing in the spring.  If that’s the case this might work.  Maybe when everything starts to thaw and warm up this brussel sprout plant will begin to grow again in late winter.  If it gets big enough in early spring and starts growing the actual brussel sprouts, it could be great.  At that time we’ll still have enough weather that brings frost which will increase the taste of the brussel sprouts.  We’ll see how it all turns out.

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Making herbs last in the snow

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During the holiday season I end up using a lot of herbs for gravies, rubs, etc. One of my favorite herbs for that is rosemary. You can see that we’ve had a bit of bad weather. I don’t feel like going out to the garden and covering all the boxes with plastic for protection. So I’ve done what you can see in the picture-I’ve just inverted a regular container directly over the rosemary plant. Sure it’s still pretty cold out, but the plastic keeps the hard wind off the plants which can really be the difference between the plant living and dying. This particular rosemary plant is 2 years old. When the sun comes out I make sure to take the cover off to give it some much needed light. It is true that if your weather is harsh-too much snow, extended periods of cold temperatures, and not much sun-these will not survive. But this gives the plant a fighting chance. This little technique won’t work for things such as basil because those herbs die off at the first frost. But your more hardy herbs can make it through with just a little extra help from you and Mother Nature. I love growing herbs in my gardens and try to make them last as long as I can. My good friend-RDG-grows and preserves sage. I haven’t grown that before but I think I’ll try it next year. It’s a great herb for the holidays. He’s got some great information about how to do it as you can read here. There’s really nothing like being able to go out to your gardens and pull some fresh herbs. Sure you can buy them at the market, but even the best stores can’t compete with them pulled fresh from your gardens. Not to mention the astronomical price they ask you to pay.[ois skin=”below post”]

No square foot gardening work but still staying busy

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With a couple of snow storms under our belt and some colder weather there’s really not a lot for me to do. I’ve ordered some brand new seeds from Burpee’ which look like a lot of fun. I’ve also had my eye on some great new things coming from Johnny’s seeds. In particular this new salad mix called “Salanova.” If anyone has had experience with the taste of it please get back to me. It’s some sort of European mix so we might not have a lot of experience with it here in the States. I’ve got 5 people that I grow for in my 148 square foot garden and I’m looking for some really great new things. This might be one of them. A few weeks ago I raked up all my leaves and ended up with about 30 bags. I’ve got a couple of new things I’m experimenting with back in the garden which I’ll talk about later-I just need some time to see how or if it will work. I’ve also got a new growing pattern that you might find interesting-a way to get even more out of 1 square foot. I’m documenting everything and taking lots of pictures to show what it all looks like and will post as soon as I get some results. It shouldn’t be too much longer. But what am I going to be doing with 30 bags of leaves? I’ll use about 3 or 4 of them for my spring/summer/fall needs. The rest? You might not believe this but I have folks who are going to pay me for all those bagged leaves! They want to make compost beginning next spring, and all the local leaves are now long gone to the city dump. I don’t know if I should sell them as just bagged leaves or make compost out of them myself and then sell it? Either way, did you ever think that someone would pay for a bag of leaves? It was a new one for me. But it is one of the greatest things you can add to your compost. I ran some stats on my website the past week and discovered that the 3rd most frequent visitors are from the land “down under”-Australia! I know you’re just starting your summer season down there and I hope you all have great success with your square foot gardens. And if your not a square foot gardener I hope you’ll give it some thought. It’s the best way to garden! Maybe there’s a thing or two here that will give you some additional ideas.

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Square foot garden breakfast potatoes

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I woke up this morning and wanted to go out for breakfast but didn’t have the energy to fight off the crowds. I had a few things around the kitchen like eggs, leftover turkey and cheese. But what about some hash browns? Well, I just went out to my garden and snipped off a sprig of rosemary. I’ve got onions and 40 pounds of red Pontiac potatoes stored in the garage. Within 30 minutes I had an omelet with turkey and cheese and these tasty little breakfast potatoes. Yum…roasted potatoes from the garden with onions, rosemary and freshly ground pepper. It doesn’t get any better than this. And I probably saved $10. I’m good with that, how about you? Square foot gardening-the only way to go.

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