Tag Archives: tomatoes

Prepping and planning for winter garden

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First week of September marks the time when I begin transitioning summer to fall and winter gardening. To make room I’ll need to pull up a few things like beans, kale, and maybe even a tomato plant or two, which really hurts!

I counted 16 different crops that I grow for winter. All do well in our freezing, snowy winters. As long you know how to put up a simple structure for protection and match the crop to the season anybody can enjoy the winter bounty. And, it’s so fun to do. The taste? It can only be described as awesome. Freezing temps turn starches to sugar so your carrots are delicious. The same for spinach and baby lettuces. Arugula is less spicy.

I’ve also mass planted several grow bags with lettuce varieties that will begin to be harvested in 40-45 days and will last until about the end of November, though I will have them under cover when the temperatures get to cold. I continue to discover great varieties that can’t be bought anywhere in the stores that have great taste. When those are done the salad greens planted today and through mid-October will all be ready. Those crops will last our family until about mid-March.

On October 25 I will sown a cold frame with lettuces. Lots of lettuces. That will be ready by the time all winter greens have been harvested-third of 4th week of March. That’s my rotation anyway.  

My small SFG-CSA

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I’ve had so much fun this spring and summer growing the tastiest things ever. And getting ready  to have a great fall and winter garden. I’m able to grow enough in my 184 square feet of garden space to provide 3 local restaurants with things and 4 families. I can never compete with the food vendors to provide all their restaurant needs. Each week they get a small quantities of just picked cherry tomatoes, one wants English cucumbers, they all get different herbs, one gets kale, and two of them get microgreens. They buy because of the superior taste and the chefs know it. Spring time is very different. But, just picked fresh will beat any vendor item. It’s not farm to table for them-it’s garden to table. 

Yesterday my families got what you see in the picture. Enough lettuce for 5-6 side salads, 4 slicing tomatoes, an acorn squash, an English cucumber, and a sprig of basil. Next week they will get the same but with the addition of a small quantity of red pontiac potatoes. 

Is it just me or is inflation at the top of most people’s worry? Why not have a garden, learn how to do it in the most efficient way possible and save money. Lots of money. And have a better eating experience. The English cucumbers are absolutely out of this world. Our two year old granddaughter had never tasted cucumbers. I had about half of it sliced into pieces with ranch dressing next to it. She tasted it and all we heard for the next 15 minutes was “more.” 🙂 The only reason she stopped was because she was all full! 

 

How about some snow with those tomatoes?

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In our geography you often hear that it’s safe to plant summer crops after Mother’s day. It’s snowed twice this week-after the tomatoes have been planted. And unless you’ve got some kind of protection, your tomatoes are no longer among the living.

Yesterday I delivered some tomato, kale, and lettuce plants to a customer. As I looked at his raised bed, you couldn’t help but notice the dead existing tomato plants, squash, and zucchini they had planted a couple of weeks ago during one of those early and rare 80 degree spring days. If you want to do that you can, but only if you’re prepared to cover your crops in case of a weather emergency.

These tomato plants made it through just fine with the use of an inexpensive cloche. I don’t use anything fancy but you can spend a lot of money on them if you want. I think its a good idea to have several of these handy items available for this very purpose. Its a good thing to use when you’re first putting in your transplants as well. It protects not just from the colder weather, but also from wind, which is also a bad thing for plants just starting out.

The other nifty think I like about using cheap orange juice container such as this? If night time temperatures will be getting to low, you can simple put the cap on. It’s important to take them off the next day, especially if the sun will be coming out. After 7-10 days, I’ll remove the cloche as the weather should be safe from here on out [ois skin=”3″]

Vertical gardening-a few thoughts

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In 6-7 weeks it will be time to put tomato plants and other vining crops into the garden in our location. I always like to think one season ahead. It’s spring now, but I need to keep summer in mind. As I will be putting up my vertical towers soon, I need to have the squares where those towers are placed emptied out. If I wait even as little as a week and start planting any crop that takes longer than 50 days, those squares won’t be available to put in my tomato plants.

If you’ve got short term crops to put in, such as radishes or bigger scallion starts, you might still have enough time to clear out squares in time for squashes, tomatoes, etc. I’ve tried to illustrate this by the picture. The back row is completely planted and will be ready for clearing out in about 4-5 weeks. All my vining crops will be ready for planting in time for a great summer season. This takes some advanced planning but helps to make your square foot garden as efficient as it can be.

This lesson, taught to me years ago, has had to be reinforced a few times. I started my tomato seeds inside during the first week of April. When the danger of frost had passed and the time arrived for putting tomatoes out-the 2nd or 3rd week of May, those squares still had crops in them which needed another 2-3 weeks to finish growing. I could either wait until they were done, which would really put me behind, or I had to put my vertical towers in another location which were not the best. I chose the latter but had to put up with shading in the later months.

The take home lesson? Figure out where your vertical towers will be placed and fill those squares up as early as possible for them to be cleared out in time for your vining crops[ois skin=”3″]

Bye bye tomatoes!!!

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IMG_1716The end of October and I’m about out of tomatoes. Very sad! For me it marks the end of the summer garden and I know that winter is around the corner. We’ve enjoyed more tomatoes this year than we ever have in the past. I grew 16 tomato plants using 5 different varieties. These varieties are the ones I”ll alway grow. Lots of cherry tomatoes, several Roma types, and then a standard tomato variety.

One evening I went out to find that a few of my cherry tomatoes had fallen to the ground. When that happens I know they’ve been on the vine too long and are over ripe. At that point I began pulling them off the vine-from the bottom-to put in the freezer for the winter. We enjoy delicious pasta sauce for months with these tomatoes. There’s little work and the taste-you would never know they were frozen. I simply don’t have the time(or money)to put all of these up for storage.

One thing I learned this year about all the different types of tomatoes: cherry tomatoes are definitely king! Folks enjoy the regular and paste type of tomatoes, but one mouthful of pure sugar from these cherry tomatoes make a believer out of anyone. Last week I offered a handful of Sun Gold cherry tomatoes to a neighbor. “I’m not a tomato fan but our son is-I’ll give them to him.” She then tasted one to make sure she didn’t like them: “Oh my! I’ve never tasted a tomato like this! What kind are these? It’s like a mini-sugar explosion in your mouth!” I think she’ll take all she can get next year.

Last point-don’t let anyone tell you that you can’t grow tomatoes in 1 square foot! I think it’s the only way to do it. [ois skin=”1″]