Gardening as Winter Looms

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How to Keep Up Gardening in the Winter

by Sandy Swegel

Nothing like the first deeply freezing temperatures followed by a warm day to get people in Zone 5 areas asking if the gardening season is really over if they can still tackle their garden to do lists even though winter looms with Thanksgiving is around the corner.  We have two conflicting impulses…the really good bulbs are on sale at our local garden center AND there’s an inch of snow and refrozen ice on the garden bed.

What does happen to our soil in winter? Once soil temperatures are in the forties, all the creatures and denizens of the soil put themselves to sleep through dormancy or through laying lots of eggs or spores that will hatch when temperatures are warmer.  Seeds stop germinating or else require weeks and weeks at low temperature to come up.  They’re smart…no point in germinating if sub-zero temperatures in another few weeks are going to kill young growth. So the soil goes into stasis until the temperatures warm.

Here are some of the questions I hear people asking as our soil begins its freeze:

Can I still plant bulbs? Can I transplant daylilies now? Yes, if you can pry the soil open and get water to the plant, there’s a good chance your bulbs will bloom and the daylily will be fine. Daffodils especially prefer getting planted earlier to have some time to make roots. Sometimes blooming is delayed the first season, but I have had good success in planting bulbs too late…especially if I throw in some compost in the hole and don’t plant too shallowly. I’ve also had years when the bulbs just ended up being frozen mush…so plant earlier next year.

Can I put in a cover crop? In Zone 5, it’s too late.  The temperatures are too cold for seed germination.  Put lots of mulched leaves over the soil to cover it.

Do I have to water? Ideally, you got the garden well watered sometime in Fall through rain or irrigation.  If not or if there are long dry sunny spells, you should winter water.

What do I do with my Fall greens that are freezing solid? Keep eating…they get better every day.  Spinach frozen at 8 am is delicious at room temperature.  If you cover greens with row cover or a cold frame or even throw big bags of leaves over the plants, you can keep harvesting easily through January or longer if you haven’t eaten them all.

Can I still use herbs? Yep, remember where your herbs are and you can put your hand through a foot of snow for snippings of intensely flavored frozen thyme or oregano leaves.

Can I still fertilize? You can, but the soil organisms won’t be processing it.  Organic fertilizer like alfalfa meal stay on the soil and will eventually be used when things warm up next Spring.

Is there something I should plant?  Winter hardy violas and pansies don’t mind a little snow and ice.  In a sunny location, they’ll keep throwing up blooms all winter long…a surprise of color in a white or brown winter-scape. Plant well hardened off plants and keep them watered.

For more details on the science of soil in winter, check out this article from the Bountea compost tea company. http://www.bountea.com/articles/lifeinwintersoil.html

How to Become a Plant Nerd

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How to Become a Plant Nerd

by Sandy Swegel

You know you are a Plant Nerd When…
(Or How to Become a Plant Nerd)

You know every garden starts with graph paper. You draw a scale drawing with trees and fences.

You create an Excel file listing the times to seed and days to harvest. Your file shows when to plant second crops for fall veggies.

You automate your garden
You put a timer on for watering. Your smartphone calendar alerts you six weeks before the last frost. You have to use a moisture sensor to know when to water.

You know the scientific names of your weeds.

You make the most of what you have.
You never plant in rows…you know it’s more efficient to plant densely in quadrants. If space is limited, you grow vertically. If all you have is a balcony to grow on you figure out how to make a hydroponic system out of a Rubbermaid container.

Your garden is full of experiments.
You test everything before you believe it. You have one section of peas planted with inoculant and one section planted without inoculant to see if it matters. You plant carrots with tomatoes and measure yield to see if it made a differences

You collect data.
You have a max-min thermometer to see the actual temperature in your yard. You write down how many days it took pepper seeds to germinate. You record when the apple trees blossomed and when you got your first tomato. You weigh your giant pumpkin to see if it weighs more than you do.

You make use of technology.
You use frost cloth and low tunnels to extend your season, and red plastic mulch to increase tomato yield.

 

You have taste testings to see which tomato tastes better.

You know the variety names of the vegetables you eat.

You love problems in the garden because it means you get to come up with a solution!

In other words, you garden smarter not harder.

You’re my superhero.

 

Photo Credit:  http://www.pinterest.com/pin/174796029262705028/

 

 

 

1000 bags of leaves and what to do with them

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How to Repurpose Fall Leaves

by Sandy Swegel

Fall leaves are Nature’s parting gift from the growing season to the gardener.  Tree roots run deep and wide and have collected minerals and nutrients from deep in the soil.  These are nutrients that then spent the summer high in the sky at treetop collecting sun rays and are now being placed abundantly at your feet.

If you’ve been gardening any length of time you know how valuable leaves are.  They decompose beautifully in the compost bin when mixed in with the green matter.  You can run them over with the mower to break them down and use them as mulch in all your garden beds.  You can keep piles of them in a shady moist corner of the garden decomposing down into leaf mold which is a superior soil amendment.

The most important thing gardeners in my neighborhood do within Fall leaves is collect them.  Our neighbor Barbara is the Queen of Fall Leaves and had taught us about how valuable leaves are to the gardener.  She lives on a busy street and puts a big cardboard sign in front of her house every year that says “Bagged Leaves Wanted.” Pretty soon bags and bags of leaves start piling up, brought from strangers all over town who are happy to have a place to recycle their leaves.  Barbara gets the first 1000 bags and about fifteen of us split the next 1000 bags of leaves.

So what do you do with 1000 bags of leaves?

Mulch the garden beds. Some of the leaves have already been chopped by blower vacs. These leaves easily go on perennial beds.

Mulch the garden paths.  Big dried leaves that are slow to break down like oak leaves or pine needles go on the paths to keep the weeds down.

Put a layer over the vegetable garden. If you don’t till in the spring, a thick layer of leaves will block light and suppress weeds and keep in moisture. But wait, you say, the wind will blow the leaves away.  That’s when you put the bagged leaves on top of the garden. It’s a place to store extra leaves and the weight of the bags keeps the loose leaves from blowing away. Moisture collects under the bags and earthworms come to feast there.

Till the molding leaves into the soil in Spring with the cover crop.

Insulate the cold frame or greenhouse with bags of leaves stacked around.

Line the troughs you dig for your potatoes next year with rotting leaves.

Make easy Leaf Mold.  Stack the bags that look like they don’t have holes somewhere (as insulation or just as storage) and put the hose in to fill the bag about ¼ way with water.  This makes speedy leaf mold.

Use as free litter for chickens and bunnies. If you have farm animals, dried leaves are perfect free litter for the bottom of the coop or cage. And the manure is already pre-mixed with carbon for composting.

Feed the Goats. The most fun thing to do with the leaves (aside from jumping in piles of them) is to feed the goats.  Apparently, dry leaves are yummy like potato chips to goats and they come running to eat the crunchiest ones when I’m hauling the latest bag of leaves to the backyard.

Happy goats running with floppy ears flying is a highlight of my day.

Photo credit:  http://www.onehundreddollarsamonth.com/mavis-garden-blog-how-to-find-free-compost/

Seeds are the New Hollywood Celebrities

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Seed Stories You Need to Check Out

By Sandy Swegel

Seeds are the New Hollywood Celebrities

The importance of seeds to life on Earth is growing in our consciousness. Have you noticed there are a number of new movies and other media about seeds? “Seeds” and “Sustainable Farming” are definitely “IN.” Many films are now available online for free and others are being screened in local communities.

Here are a few that I know about.

“Seeds of Time” 2013
SEEDS OF TIME follows agriculture pioneer Cary Fowler’s global journey to save the eroding foundation of our food supply in a new era of climate change. The reviews rave about great nature photography.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2962826/

“Open Sesame” 2013
This film tells the story of seeds by following the challenges and triumphs of some of their most tireless stewards and advocates.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2962826/

“Bitter Seeds” 2011
These are sad stories about farmers in India
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2306473/

“Harvest of Fear”
A Nova, Frontline PBC special about the GMO debates.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/harvest/

“The Vanishing Seeds Film Project.”
about seeds and deforestation in Africa.
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Vanishing-Seeds-Film-Project/127333317308892

 

Here are a few of the TV Programs:

“Farm Kings” about farmers in Pittsburg
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2962826/

A Reality TV program “The Farm” is popular in Europe.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Farm_(TV_series)

And the newest show, Chipotle has sponsored
“Farmed and Dangerous” on Hulu
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2852872/

Photo credit:http://www.mindful.org/the-mindful-society/activism/sprouting-seeds-of-compassion

When Hard Frost Finally Comes

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How to Prepare for the Cold

by Sandy Swegel

We’re supposed to get freezing temperatures soon, and it’s getting beyond the point where a bed sheet thrown over the tomatoes is going to help.  This is when the hard frost finally comes and it’s time to harvest those green tomatoes and put them in the house or cool garage.  I personally don’t start immediately making green tomato recipes because I’ve found most of the tomatoes will ripen and turn red if they’re big enough and don’t have wounds where mold will form before ripening happens.

I also harvested cucumbers and some late-season beans and three red peppers hiding under some tomato foliage.  A blanket is going over the big pumpkin that the neighbor’s kid (he’s 30 years old) wants to keep growing until it’s heavier than he is. Last year he made it with a 147 pounds of pumpkin!  All the greens and root crops and cabbages will be fine.

As I walked around the garden yesterday afternoon, I noticed the biggest threat to the remaining plants was drought.  The weather has been cool so I didn’t think about water, but the low humidity all week is sucking all the moisture out of the air and out of the plants.  So I do need to run the overhead sprinkler for an hour or two to return moisture to the leaves.  That extra water on leaf surfaces will freeze at night and help protect the plants.

Water is important now if you garden in an arid place because we tend to let the garden’s needs slip from our minds while we’re enjoying the fall colors.  When we see foliage browning we first assume it’s just the season, but as my poor limp Comfrey showed me, everything needed a good soak.  Rain a week ago has long evaporated from the surface of the topsoil.   A local plant expert told me once that he found the key to helping plants overwinter was making sure they went into winter well watered. Water in the soil will freeze and help protect roots.

One more thing I’ll do before it freezes tonight:  get out there with my camera and take pictures of the garden in its final days of glory. Something to warm my heart on dreary gray winter days.

Let them Sweeten

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All About Cold-Sweetening

by Sandy Swegel

I spent the week with my sister Anne.  It’s enough to make me doubt the entire idea or theory of DNA and genetics that suggest we are related in some cellular way.  Except for the fact that we look like sisters, we are so different, the family joke ran this way.  “You’re so weird.  You must have been switched at the hospital.” “No, you’re so weird. You were the one switched.”  After some bickering my mother would chime in, “I don’t know where either of you odd ducks came from.  I must have been the one switched at the hospital.

It was evident as we were sitting around the kitchen table that she is a finisher, somebody who gets projects finished.  I have to hold on to my coffee cup if I don’t want it cleared off the table half full.  She wants breakfast finished and the table cleared.

It can be hard to share a garden with a finisher.  Her idea of dealing with the garden as the leaves start to fall is to pull everything out right now and rake the soil nice and tidy and be done with it till next April.  So naturally, I was howling as she’s shoveled up the beets and yanked the kale.  “No, leave it alone. It’s finally getting really good. Don’t you know this is when the root vegetables get really good and sweet?!”  Fortunately, we are adults and I skipped the “how can you not know that” remark and she threw up her hands and walked away muttering “Whaaateverr.”

Let them sweeten, cold-sweetening in vegetables is a real thing. Plants produce sugars through photosynthesis and store the sugars as starches.  But in cold temperatures, plant break down the starches into “free” sugars and store them in cells to protect against frost damage.  Scientists describe the process as “Sugar dissolved in a cell makes it less susceptible to freezing in the same way that salting roads reduces ice.”

 

And it makes the vegetables taste so good too!  As long as you can pry the soil open before it freezes solid, you should leave the root vegetables like beets and carrots in the ground.  Kale, chard and spinach full of sugar can be frozen solid first thing in the morning and be delicious and undamaged to eat at dinnertime.  Cold-sweetened Brussels sprouts are worth fighting for.

 

The only vegetable you don’t want to cold-sweeten are potatoes, because you want them full of starch.  That’s why you don’t store potatoes in the refrigerator.  All the extra sugars make cold-sweetened potatoes turn brown during cooking. You reverse the process in potatoes by keeping them in a warmer room and the sugars convert back to starch.

Cold-sweetening is also why you store your winter squashes and root vegetables out in the unheated garage…someplace that doesn’t freeze but also isn’t as warm as the house.

Vegetables to cold sweeten:

Carrots, Beets, squash, kale and chard, broccoli, Brussels sprouts (Yes!), leeks, spinach, parsnips and radicchio, and best of all, Apples.  Leave those apples on the tree as long as you can…they get better every day in the fall.

 

Photo credit: http://www.organicgardening.com/learn-and-grow/storing-vegetables-for-the-winter

Sweeter After A Frost

 

Is It Time?

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Is There Still Time to Plant Seeds?

by Sandy Swegel

Is it time? Is it too late?  Can I still plant seeds?  These are the questions I heard this week.  In our Zone 5 area, garden centers are already starting to discount plants and seasonal workers will get laid off by the 4th of July. Does that mean it’s too late to plant seeds and you should just buy the biggest plant you can find?

Generally, the answer is, of course, there is still time to plant seeds…It’s only June!  For gardeners, the truest answer is always, “It Depends.”

There are a few seeds that it is too late to plant. In Zone 5 or other short growing season areas, it’s too late to plant watermelon or winter squash or tomatoes by seed.  The “days to maturity” info on the back of the seed package tells you that you need 90-100 days before the plant makes its first ripe fruit.  100 days from now is mid-September before you might get a watermelon…that doesn’t work when we might have frost by then…or at the very least cold nights.

The flip side of this question is, “Are there seeds I should plant rather than buy plants?”  Absolutely.  It makes no sense to buy a broccoli or cauliflower plant now for $4.00 when it’s just going to bolt in the summer heat.  It likes cooler weather.  And you could probably buy the broccoli itself cheaper.  But in a couple of weeks, market farmers are starting their broccoli seeds to get their fall crops going. Planting broccoli and cauliflower soon is a great idea!

Annuals are still a great bargain to plant.  I went into sticker shock when I went plant shopping this year.  Plant prices are up about 30 percent in my area.  For less than the price of a 4-inch pot with a marigold, I can get one seed packet of marigolds and have dozens and dozens of plants in bloom in only 45 days.  They’ll be super cute all over the garden and in the vegetable garden, they’ll help repel pests.

It’s the same for cosmos and California poppies and zinnias and all the annual wildflower mixes.  There’s still time.  For perennial seed, some plants might not bloom till next year, but the plants will be strong and it’s a lot easier to start seeds now in the garden where you want them to grow instead of inside under lights in the middle of winter.

Buying bedding plants is great for instant gratification, but gardeners know that if you want a garden full of hundreds of flowers (without breaking the bank), SEEDS are the way to go!

So there IS still time. Lots of time for annual flowers like cosmos and zinnias and sunflowers and bachelor buttons and zinnias and for big flowery herbs.  Then there all those vegetables to seed.  And the perennials you are admiring in bloom now. You get the idea. There is plenty of time to plant by seed and enjoy them this year.

 

Heirloom vegetable seed

Wildflower Mixes

Pollinator mixes

What to Unplant

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How to Help Your Plants Stay Productive

by Sandy Swegel

I’ve been watching my neighbor Tory’s vegetable garden with great interest this year. She worked as a farm intern (ie. Full-time farming, almost no money) the last couple of years and has brought farm techniques to her home garden. Yesterday as we enjoyed the latest harvest of arugula she announced it was time to dig these up and plant something else.  I was surprised since she just seeded these arugula in early March.

From a market farming perspective, you grow greens to harvest a lot of food quickly.  She seeded the arugula early and when they are big enough to harvest she cuts them to just an inch or so above the soil level.  Then she lets them grow again and the cycle repeats.  Plants grown like this produce a lot of food, but they also get tired and worn out.  The plant itself is depleted.  Tory made her decision to dig under the arugula because the plants weren’t growing as vigorously as before and, the biggest factor, they didn’t taste as good. Whether it was the hard fast growth or a recent week of warm weather, the arugula was getting a little too spicy.  It seems harsh, but if you want to keep eating from your garden, you have to unplant the less productive plants and know what to unplant.

Things I’ve unplanted this week:
Arugula that has been harvested three times and is losing vigor.HERB, Organic Arugula, Wild
Kale that had overwintered. It was great to have kale from last year’s plants, but the old woody stems are no longer producing as well as the new plants.
Radishes that got bitter.  A week of rain followed by a week of heat made huge bitter radishes. They look great but we crave sweet young vegetables.

Garden more productive and more beautiful.

In the perennial garden, I’ve been unplanting too.
Poppies that have spread everywhere.  They are at risk of becoming a weed.
Plants that have grown too big for where they are planted.
Plants that are blocking sprinkler heads.
Plants that I’ve never liked.

Gardeners are often loathe getting rid of plants. They feel sorry for them.  They’ve come to know them as friends.  But there is a time and season for every plant and a good gardener learns to be a little ruthless. If you want to have succession gardening, you have to create the empty space for the next plant. It may seem harsh, but you have to declutter and make space for new growth!

 

 

Spring Tune-up for your Drip Irrigation

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Irrigation Checklist

by Sandy Swegel

For gardeners in dry climates, irrigation is a necessary evil.  Irrigation makes growing possible, but it can be a

royal pain trying to keep it intact and actually watering the plants it is intended to water.  You will have fewer problems with your irrigation (and thus fewer dying plants) if you take the time in Spring to tune-up your drip system.

To tune-up your drip system, wait for a fine day in Spring after there has been a dry period, and manually turn your drip system on and run it for about 15 minutes.

Here’s your check list:

 Obvious leaks and holes.  This is easy….a big spray of water up in the air is the surest sign an emitter has popped out of its hole or a line has been accidentally cut.  I use the little flags on sticks to mark places that will need repair.

 Dislocated or broken lines. The reason you run the drip system for 15 minutes before you start to check individual plants is so you will easily be able to see the spreading moisture in the soil under each dripper.  If you can physically see a little drip line but no water, then the line is clogged or has been dislocated from the main supply line.  How does this happen?  Squirrels and dogs disconnect lines when they run through the garden.  Little creatures like mice have figured out that water runs through these lines and a little nibbling on the tubing provides a water supply from the water left in the line.  Most of the time you just reconnect the tubing and are done.

 Clogged emitters.  Sometimes emitters just break but most of the time an emitter that’s not emitting is just clogged.  Tiny insects have figured out this water source too….and sometimes lay eggs right in the emitter tip, which from their perspective is probably a nice moist cave. Usually just taking the emitter and blowing into it is enough to clear the line.  I’ve also seen plant roots grow up a tube looking for water.

 Sliced lines.  This is from human error.  A garden full of tiny drip lines and sprinkler supply lines shallowly buried means the gardener accidentally slices through the irrigation system, sometimes not realizing it.  A big puddle of water instead of the small moist area around an emitter is your clue.  Just fix it and resolve not to dig in the garden without checking for the location of the irrigation line.

Spring tuning your irrigation can be tedious, but well worth it in terms of keeping your plants alive.  While you’re at the task, this is a good time to check the times on your controller.  Sometimes in August and September when it’s hot and dry, we crank up the length of time the irrigation runs….Plants don’t usually need so much water in Spring, so you can save water and money by having different run times in Spring and Summer.

Drip irrigation is still my favorite way to water frugally.  You get water to the roots without having the waste of high pressure sprayers over spraying and watering the street.  Sprayers also encourage fungus from the moisture sitting on the leaves.  Installing a drip system requires us to get in touch with our Inner Engineer, but it’s a very successfully way to water if you just do a Spring Tune-up.

 

Photo: http://www.dripirrigation.com/drip_irrigation_tutorial

http:///http://home.howstuffworks.com/irrigation3.htm

 

 

 

First Things: Start More Seeds

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Seed Starting

by Sandy Swegel

I had the good fortune to go backstage, so to speak, at a CSA farm this week. Lara’s farm is amazingly

small. On just over an acre she almost single-handedly feeds 35 families. She has an unheated greenhouse and a rototiller, but otherwise, that’s as high-tech as she goes. Trying to fathom how one person can feed so many people, I kept asking questions and observing what she did. One thing was obvious. Farmers don’t stand around with their arms folded gabbing, at least not at the beginning of the day.  We had a running conversation, but her hands were busy, filling planting trays or picking off dead foliage, watering here and there. But her primary motto, that she learned from a mentor farmer, was to keep starting seeds. Every day, every time you go into the garden, “she said” you should ask if seeds need to be started. Weeding, composting, deadheading and even watering can wait till later but if your seeds aren’t started and going, you aren’t going to have plants which means you won’t have enough food or enough flowers. Watering is second on the list. It doesn’t do much good to have started seeds last week if you let them dehydrate this week.

Growing a garden from seed is both miraculous and frustrating. Miraculous is obvious: you take this tiny seed and it becomes something magnificent: a pumpkin or a breathtaking flower. But the frustrating part is that there’s no catching up if you procrastinate getting your seeds started.  You can fiddle with heat mats and lots of extra plant food, but there’s really no way to do last minute cramming to get plants growing. They need time to grow. 

So let that be the first question in your garden today. Are there some new seeds I need to get started?

Here’s my answer of seeds I should start today:

Spent daffodils and tulips have left an empty spot in the flower garden. I should plant some cosmos seeds there to have flowers for the rest of the year.

We harvested the radishes in the square foot garden. I need to fill that square so I put a few kale seeds in.

Last year I learned how to roast butternut squash with olive oil and rosemary so I need to make sure I have lots of butternut squash saved up. I need to start six seeds on the window sill (the soil is still cold at my house.)

I visited a friend’s garden that was full of foxglove which often doesn’t bloom until the second year. I need to start those seeds so I have a beautiful flower garden like she does next year.

What seeds should you start today?