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.

Harvest Monday

First Homegrown Artichoke

Monday, Monday, Harvest Monday.... I look forward to this time each week, where we can share our successes and commiserate over the not so good stuff (I refuse to call them failures; if nothing else they are compost!) Thanks Daphne's Dandelions, for being our hostess and getting us all together!

I think my most exciting news this week is picking my very first homegrown artichoke. As you can see it's a bit on the small side and I may have picked it too soon (there was absolutely no 'choke' in it at all). But I was worried about our temps hitting 96 and it going past it's prime too quick. Well, it was tender, delicious and absolutely wonderful.  I don't think I've eaten a fresh arti since I was a kid and we lived in California. I always thought it was great fun to be able to eat with my fingers and get messy and nobody said anything to me because they were doing the same thing!

After I cut this one I could see that there are three more little ones hiding underneath it! Soooo looking forward to more!

Of course I had lots of eggs, (and sold my first dozen!) lots of salad, the Mammoth Melting peas are coming on strong too. And I discovered that even when they are getting lumpy they are still sweet and delicious, they just get a string like an old fashioned green bean. There were a couple of bug eaten strawberries (discovered the culprit, it's the pill bugs aka potato bugs aka rolly polly), a couple of spears of asparagus and a big of broccoli.

The chicks have a good time playing in the greenhouse.

The chicks are growing fast, losing their fluff and growing real feathers. Every day that I can, I put them out in the greenhouse where they are reasonably safe as long as I'm around the yard. At this time it isn't predator proof so I can't leave them out there all the time. Besides which, the far end is where the rat hole is, so I couldn't leave them in there at night, large rats have been known to attack sleeping chicks.

Busting Out All Over

Striped Sweet Peas

These striped sweet peas are the most fragrant of all; they are highly intoxicating! Much more so than the pink or red ones that started blooming first.

Baby Bonanza Peach

You've seen the baby plums, well we have baby peaches too, along with.....

baby artichoke

A baby artichoke! I'm soooo excited!

Hale's Best Jumbo Cantaloupe

Royal Burgundy Bush Beans

The cantaloupe and bush beans in the cold frame are doing well and growing like crazy.

But this bed of brassicas in the back garden are doing very poorly. I think the soil just isn't up to snuff yet and of course I let the henbit and chickweed over run them. This is also one of the beds that gets very little direct sun in Dec & Jan. A couple of plants in here look like they are trying to perk up and do something so I'll give them a little longer, otherwise it's off to the chickens with them!

I've been getting some vermicompost out of the worm box and feeding worms to the chickens, which of course they love. I've also been planting and transplanting seeds and seedlings all over the place, with many more to go.

Harvest Monday

Fresh Eggs!

And it's Harvest Monday once again! Harvest Monday is a great blog hop sponsored by Daphne's Dandelions. A great way to visit gardens all over the world!

I didn't take too many pictures of harvests this week, just too busy doing other things, but I got lots of eggs, 4 hens averaging 3 a day.

I got a couple of spears of asparagus, picked some mustard, chard and lamb's quarters for cooking.

salad

I picked lots of salad with lettuce, mache, claytonia, chard, spinach, lamb's quarters, chickweed, chives, viola blossoms.

peas

I picked lots of peas, Dwarf Grey Sugar from the tubs in the greenhouse and the Mammoth Melting Sugar out in the garden are beginning to come on. In the photo the two extra large pods on the upper right are the Mammoths and the others are the Dwarf Greys.  It's getting  a bit warm in the greenhouse for the peas and I wanted to move them outside to a cooler spot, but the three tubs have all grown together so I can't move them without ripping them apart. I will have to remember next time to give them more space and keep them separate. Because they are so warm they are really getting past their prime quickly, before the pods are even very large, I just let them go to make more seed for next year.

Green Globe Artichoke

Around the yard: The two artichoke plants I put in last fall are growing fast, hoping for 'chokes soon.

baby lettuce

I'm now looking for every damp shady spot I can find to plant a patch of lettuce in. These little guys are out front covered with window screen to protect them from the birds.

Sweet Peas

The first sweet pea blossom opened this week; heavenly!

sweet peas & violas

The sweet peas are on a small obelisk in a large wash tub by the front gate and surrounded by the violas.

Tall iris

This tall two toned iris doesn't usually bloom until about mid-May, so it's waaay early!

worm bed experiment

I loved Harvey Urssery's worm beds in his greenhouse and decided to try something similar in the narrow paths between my raised beds. These bed dry out way too fast and I've thought eventually I will take the sides away and dig them down lower into the ground. Then I thought perhaps I could make worm beds between them with scrap lumber to walk on. That would keep the sun off the sides of them and help keep them from drying out too fast as well as growing more worms for chicken feed.

trellis bed ready for planting

I also got this trellis bed ready for planting. You can see the before pictures on my post from the other day.  I've decided to plant a few cukes at one end and then the rest in beans. I don't eat that many pickles so don't really need a ton of cucumbers. And I eat way more beans than cukes!