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By Annette, on January 10th, 2012% We live (as I think I’ve mentioned) in the Bermuda Triangle of weather here. Common mythology says it rains every afternoon in Florida in the summer for a short while. In our corner of the county, the fronts and clouds and rain seem to break apart or skirt to the north or south of us, never quite reaching potential. There was a period last year where it didn’t rain for over a month here although it rained in areas around us. So when we look at the forecast, and it says 20% or 40% chance of rain for us, we plan on watering because the better chance is that it won’t rain on us. Things are looking up tonight and tomorrow, though: 60% tonight, 70% tomorrow. We may get lucky, and the trees back in the orchard will stop looking quite so sad and pathetic, and the garlic will be watered without me having to get the irrigation rerun on the reconfigured frames out front.
Two more flats started: habanero, jalapeno, two types of cayenne, tabasco, pepperoncino. Next up: more onions for our short days here.
By Annette, on January 8th, 2012% I promised myself that this weekend would see at least one flat started in the (now clean) barn. Done: artichokes, lavender, stevia, and oregano went into this one. They’re settled in, the dome is on, and the lights are lowered to just above the top of the dome, set on a timer so I don’t have to remember to go out every evening to turn them off.
Last night while clicking around I found someone’s page about the exact, necessary steps to start pepper seeds. I agreed with some of the items, but disagreed with more, and closed it out, vowing to continue my method that according to this person should not work at all. The final seven plus pounds of peppers I took in just after the new year before the killing frost came tells me we must be on the right track.
More flats to come. Next weekend I’d like to start the tomatoes and peppers to get them going and be ready by March to get them out. I took a detour through the rear garden on my way back in, and despite what I’d hoped, the shelling peas did not survive the temperatures in the teens that we had. Those will need to come out, but that’s a good thing, as it means I can top those frames with some good topsoil and compost to have them ready for whatever will go in there next. Brassicas, I think. Today during football will be an ideal time to map out what goes where for spring planting.
By Annette, on January 4th, 2012% Thanks for the question, Ben! Of course I have mighty big plans for the coming year – but don’t we all? I decided this coming year needs to be much better planned than last, so I took the time to figure out how much plantable space I have: 2680 square feet in the frames that are not used by things that won’t be moved (asparagus and strawberries). This does not include any of the other berries or fruit/nut trees. In addition, I currently have a number of frames tied up in garlic production, and those will not be available until at least May at the very earliest.
I have planned much of the same things for 2012 as we’ve had in years past: tomatoes, both sweet and hot peppers, onions, peas, snap beans, dry beans, brussels, cabbage, lots of herbs, broccoli, cauliflower, potatoes, sweet potatoes, cukes, okra, summer squash, zucchini, peanuts, tobacco, corn, winter squashes, melons, beets, spinach, leeks, lettuce, pumpkins, and many, many flowers (and clover) for the bees.
Now, having said that, I tried to stick to fewer varieties of tomatoes this year, but couldn’t resist a sampling of them to see what we can get to grow around here. The Cherokee Purples were doing well until the worm invasion, but we got a grand total of zero from the late plantings before I let them go in the freeze last night. The peppers performed quite admirably, and I am mostly staying with the same varieties. For the bells, I’ve selected Revolution to replace Fat N Sassy as the big blocky bell. I’ve also added pepperoncini peppers to the hot pepper mix, for pickling.
Average last front here is the second week of March, although a couple of years ago we had a freak freeze the first week of April. That’s the only time that’s happened in all the time I can recall, so the plan is to get things started this month and put them out around mid-March (coincidentally, the same time as my birthday, and I can’t imagine a better gift to myself than to be grubbing around in the dirt). The first rounds of tomatoes will be in this group, along with the first rounds of broccoli and cauliflower. Sow things like peas and cukes directly, along with lettuces. When the determinate tomatoes have finished their output, which would be June/July for most, pull those and replace with okra, since okra doesn’t care about how hot it will be. Put in the dry beans, as they’re fine in the heat. In August, restart flats in the barn with the second round of tomatoes. In September, restart flats with another round of the brassicas (broccoli, cauliflower, brussels). By now, we should be able to check in on the bees and see how much production they’ve had for the season, and harvest a bit from them. Late September/early October, plant out the flats. Later in October, plant next year’s garlic. End of the year: final harvest and cleanup. Throughout the year, successive flower planting for the bees, so there will always be something in flower for them.
That’s the goal. How closely I manage to stick to it is something we’ll have to see as we go along. The most exciting part of the year, to me, will be getting the bees to help out with pollination and seeing if we can begin harvesting some honey. And it would be nice to get a tomato or two, something we haven’t been able to do since the first year we had a garden here, due to various circumstances.
By Annette, on January 2nd, 2012% The 2011 season has finally come to an end. Tonight and over the next couple of nights, we’ll be seeing hard freezes here in the country, so I went out late this afternoon and picked the remainder of the peppers, and cut some herbs in the event the plants can’t stand the chill.
The garlic will stay out through the winter and spring, and be fine bedded down with hay for the duration.
This is the main garlic area, and there are more frames off in the distance as well. It’s looking quite healthy, and planting it earlier in October seems to have paid off, with good growth prior to the onset of real winter, such as it is around here.
The final harvest from last year’s garden, although I’m hoping the herbs will pull themselves through.
Rosemary, oregano, marjoram, thyme, shelling peas, and a bunch of peppers. The oregano has already been picked, dried, and put away. The marjoram is currently drying after several rinses to get rid of the dirt – no crunchiness allowed. That will be next to be pulled and dried, followed by the rosemary. The only issue with pulling herbs is that the rosemary is so very strong my hands smell like pine trees now, even after several washes.
In a bit, it will be time to head out and turn on the taps at the remote areas where we have lines run to avoid any nasty surprises in the morning. I’m so happy that our really cold weather tends to be very brief in duration. I’m not a fan.
By Annette, on December 29th, 2011% Bad blogger, bad! No posting on a regular basis, what is wrong with you?
Nothing wrong, just incredibly busy around here. Our season has lasted well into the winter, and we’re still harvesting peppers. The tomatoes that showed some promise going into fall succumbed to massive worm damage, so once again this year, like last, no tomatoes (although for wildly different reasons, given that last year it was a cancer of a different sort).
There’s a monarch butterfly chrysalis attached to the upended cooler by my garage, which is right near the butterfly bush I planted for the other monarch caterpillars that graced us with their presence before moving on to whatever secret place they chose to attach themselves. I’m hoping to capture it as it emerges, whenever that happens to be, and I have the plant cam set up on it.
My dreams have been invaded by images of paintings I’ve never seen hanging in galleries I’ve never visited (or heard of). My subconscious is probably trying to tell me something.
My puppy had to have the top part of one of his (non weight-bearing) toes amputated because he tore the nailbed right away from the bone on a ball-fetching excursion. It’s sad to me that he was in pain, but good that he’ll heal just fine and he’ll be right back to his duties.
The bees have been ordered, and should ship to us in May. We’ll be able to put these things to good use.
Most of this will be gone from the new barn when spring arrives, as they’ll be set up as homes for the three packages of bees (and queens) we’ll be receiving. Everyone is pretty excited about this, including me, and I’m looking forward to spring even more than usual.
Seeds for the new year were ordered and have arrived (mostly), and the next two weeks will be seed starting time in the small barn, under the lights – which I need to rerig for the pulley system I came up with to make things easier to wrangle under them. As with years past, we’ll be attempting a good variety of tomatoes to see what we like, or is we can just get any to maturity and get a harvest. This year will be better planned than previous years, to be sure.
The garlic went into the frames in late October, and is doing wonderfully thus far. By my estimate, I planted out over 2000 individual cloves this year, which will give us plenty to use and some to save as seed for next year’s planting season, I expect. I’m hoping that we’ll be able to sell some as well, since this is not the usual garlic found in grocery stores.
Here’s hoping the new year will be better than the previous years. Be sage, be happy.
By Annette, on October 2nd, 2011% Sometimes, it seems like days just start off badly, as if the world wants to crack an eye at the sunrise, yawn, and roll over for a bit more sleep.
This morning was one of those mornings. The plan was to get up in the wee hours, get the smoker going, and have some pulled pork ready by the 1 PM games. I thought I had slept through my alarm, having had only two hours of sleep the night before. Not the case: I simply set it for PM instead of AM in my fog. When I did get up and go to get the smoker going, I found that the smoker portion of my Bradley was not working at all. I also found that I was going to have to go to the NOC to take care of a server that was simply down for no apparent reason and which would not respond to a reboot request.
Thinking the smoker issue may have just been built up sawdust in the feeder, I left the heating side of the smoker on, so it would be fully to temp by the time I got back, and hurried off to the NOC. Problem found: blown power supply. Easily enough solved by swapping out the power supply, but a pain in the ass for interrupting my day, which was already not starting off well.
Back at the ranch, I finally discovered the motor that powers the feeder arm was simply not working at all. I figured I could just rig something to keep the microswitch in the down position, hoping this would keep the smoker from knowing the arm was not moving. Didn’t work – the timer that feeds the wood expects the switch to trigger and then depress when the motor arm comes around once more. The switch is also not in a position easily reached when the control unit is back together. Alas, no smoking available. But the heat still worked, so I went in to rub down the butt and get it in the thing.
I made the rub, using my usual 20+ ingredients, and then dropped one of the bottles straight down on the tile while putting it away, shattering the thing and spewing glass everywhere. Swell.
By 9:30, the butt was finally on the smoker. We didn’t eat until the late games were well underway. It was good, but not as good as it usually is, of course. I also made rolls, mom made potato salad, and I’d made a huge batch of barbeque sauce the last time around, so at the end of the day, my sisters, newphew, mom, and I had watched a bunch of football and eaten good homemade food. Not a bad end to a day that started off so poorly.
On the plus side, it was another absolutely gorgeous day on the ranch, although unlike yesterday, almost all of which I spent outside, I did nothing outdoors today at all. Tomorrow after getting one of my eyes looked at, I hope to transplant some tomatoes at least to get the last ones out of the flats. From there, I’ll be left with the brassicas and the onions to get into the frames, and will be able to move on to breaking apart the garlic bulbs into cloves and prep for that planting. The great garlic plantout of 2011 is at hand.
By Annette, on September 24th, 2011% It’s difficult to know when the seasons change here, as it can be rather abrupt (witness our move from about 80 as a high to a high of 100 in the span of three days back in “spring”). Just in time for fall, though, we have an actual slide into the season: instead of highs hovering right around 100, it’s hovering right around 90 instead. Still not enough of a “fall” for the garlic to be planted, but cool enough – relatively speaking – to get the second cropping of tomatoes and peppers in. This morning I set out 64 cherokee tomato plants and 32 bell pepper plants. There are more of each to plant, plus the brassicas, which I intend to use floating row cover on to keep the bugs away. Combine that with another round of weeding, running some irrigation, replacing one of the watering timers, and topping off the lime and lemon basils, and it’s been a productive day already. The benefit of starting off at sunrise is that it gives you a long day to get work done. Even with a break for lunch and working the business in between.
By Annette, on September 20th, 2011% The new seed garlic has arrived – all 71 pounds of it.
 This year, as last year, the seed garlic is from Big John’s Garlic. The bulbs this year are much larger than last year’s.
Our seed stock this year is Chesnok Red, Inchelium Red, Metechi, and Lorz Italian. I had thought I’d not ordered the latter, but apparently I did, as five pounds of it is in the boxes. By far the most we will be planting are the first two, at 30 pounds each. I’ll leave it to the math majors to figure out how many pounds of Metechi that means we have.
This is also a lot more garlic than we planted last year, so should be interesting to see how many frames it takes to devote to getting it all out. If next year cooperates and it doesn’t go from mid-70s to near 100 in the span of a week, our harvest should stay on track and give us enough goodly sized bulbs that we can save the largest bulbs for replanting next fall. Not that I mind ordering from Big John’s, but it takes an awful lot of garlic to keep us supplied here between what we use and what we provide to family, so we do need a decent amount of seed stock over and above what we will consume.
By Annette, on September 13th, 2011% Every year in this area, we have at least one fire. This past summer was no different, but this time around there were multiple fires and one about two miles away.
 For the past few days, we’ve had smoke drifting in and hanging around from a fire on the Florida/Georgia border – and naturally, all the tropical storms/hurricane activity has bypassed us and it, and still it burns. Since there has been virtually no wind here at all, the smoke lingers well into the afternoon, making work outside challenging. But work needs to be done regardless of this, and yesterday was yet another highly productive day: various irrigation lines repaired and extended, mulch delivered and started to be spread, and the rear garden now receiving the same treatment as the front, with the fence partially pulled, plastic laid, and the fence reconfigured. Still much more to be done, but that is always the case on the ranch.
By Annette, on September 12th, 2011% One of the additions we made this spring to the ranch was berries. I’d never really considered small fruits before, beyond the wild blackberries that grow all around the property, but while I was wandering around the garden center one day, there they were. At first, we had picked up two, but went back for four more. All went into the front garden area and then we waited.
 Well worth the wait, I must say. This was just one of many harvest rounds – the smaller harvests didn’t actually make it into the house at all, between my mother and my nephew. Although I can no longer eat blueberries that way, they are still spectacular in muffins, pancakes, and my shakes.
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2012 Harvest Totals Eggs: 703
Vegetables:
Cucumber: 6 3/4 oz
Bean, green snap: 20#
Peas (shelling): 1# 12 3/8 oz
Peppers (bell, all colors): 7# 1 7/8 oz
Herbs:
Dill: 8 oz
Marjoram: 5/8 oz
Oregano: 3/8 oz
Rosemary: 7 1/2 oz
Thyme: 6 oz
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