My Edible Garden

I've been gardening for most of my life and have been a devoted fan of organic gardening the whole time. It just makes so much more sense to work in harmony with Mother Nature than to fight her. Besides which it is better for the planet and better for our bodies. Here you can see what I'm planting and harvesting, with gardening hints and resources thrown in for good measure.

Monday, May 7, 2012

Harvest Monday

little artichokes
Well it's Harvest Monday once again. Many thanks to Daphne's Dandelions for bringing us all together!  This week I harvested these three tiny artichokes. There are a couple more buds out there, but I'm afraid they might be even smaller. I don't think my soil is rich enough yet. Maybe next year they will grow bigger.

Chicks in the garden.
I've been terrible about remembering to take harvest photos! But there have been lots of eggs, my usual salad mix, although less of it and of course the mache and claytonia are long gone. Some greens for cooking, red mustard, chard and lambs quarters mostly. Since it's warming up I did spot some red root pigweed the other day; this is a wild amaranth and the leaves are good greens.

Sometimes I let the chicks out in the front garden, they are still small enough that they don't do too much damage to the larger plants. They have a great time chasing bugs and taking dust baths.

On Sunday I harvested a some laughable broccoli shoots and finally more than two strawberries.

Broccoli and strawberries.


This fall I will get the broccoli started a lot earlier, give it more manure and more space. That should take care of getting decent sized heads next year. Although the taste is fine, it's a bit embarrassing to be an experienced gardener and have your broccoli turn out like this!

My posting from Sunday will give you a virtual Garden Tour.

9 comments:

  1. I think your artichokes look amazing! Little ones are so tender. I am jealous!

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  2. Those chicks are doing some of your dirty work for you, if they're eating the right bugs! Smart!

    http://planetpooks.com/?p=4637

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  3. Oh man...artichokes and strawberries!? Two of my absolute favorites!!! Congrats!

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  4. Red root pigweed that sounds interesting how do you use it? Those strawberries look great, lucky the chicks didn't get them!

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  5. Beautiful and well formed artichoke. I tried growing them last year but was unsuccessful.
    You reminded me that I must get my amaranth seeds into the ground. In bed for a week set me back quite a bit and am having problem catching up.

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  6. Nice harvest! How awesome to grow artichokes!!

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  7. I have artichoke buds growing too an am fearful they will not get very good sized either. I think you have to push a steady flow of high octane fertilizers at them to get the big buds and as an organic gardener that is just not something I am willing to do. I am trying to give them a drink of fish emulsion tea fairly regularly though to increase the available nitrogen to them and hopefully I may someday get some medium sized heads out of the plants. Regardless they taste wonderful (as I suspect yours did too) and I love having them in the garden.

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  8. I would love to grow some artichokes but I am so nervous about how big they will get. I think I may need a few more years at gardening before I try these.

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  9. I would love to grow artichoke but lack of space, maybe someday I can squeeze one in.

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