Harvest Monday & Seed Giveaway Winner

Baby lettuce and edible viola blossoms

Welcome to Harvest Monday! This blog hop is sponsored by Daphne's Dandelions. I do hope you will stop over there and see everyone else's harvests; it is a lot of fun to see fresh homegrown food from around the world!

So a recap of the weeks harvesting, mostly a lot of baby lettuce, which is good considering that Organic Spring Mix is over $5 a pound at the store and I can eat at least two pounds a week.  I've been tossing viola blossoms into the salad mix too. I tried my big purple pansies and they were OK but nothing to brag about. The violas have a slightly sweet taste with a lingering floral essence. They are more bite sized, too.

Baby lettuce and Easter Egg Radishes

Another day there were several Easter Egg Radishes to pull along with the baby lettuces.

Radish, mizuna, spinach, lettuce

On Sunday there was another radish, some mizuna and some baby spinach in addition to the lettuce.  There was also 2 ounces of little tomatoes. I've moved the tomato pot into the greenhouse for more protection. We haven't had a hard freeze yet but when we do I expect the tomatoes will be done for, even in the greenhouse.

Yellow Marble and Princepe Borghese Tomatoes

Harvest Totals Week of November 21-27
Lettuce and other salad greens   2 pounds, 2 oz.
Easter Egg Radish                                     1.5 oz
Tomatoes                                                   2  oz
TOTAL            2 pounds, 4.5 ounces






Now I know everyone wants to know about the seed giveaway! To read more about how I'm doing this you can read this blog post. To read more about this weeks giveaway go to  my very first Seedy Saturday post.  If you want to get in on the action stop in next week for Seedy Saturday. I am trying to get the Mr. Linky thingy so that others with seeds to give away can join in but have been having technical difficulties. I will keep trying but if not I might allow links in the comments for that day.

So now, the Winner is......drumroll please...... BeeGirl! I'll be sending you an email through your profile, but if you don't get it be sure to contact me with your snail mail address so I can send your beet seeds to you! Congratulations!

Seedy Saturday: Free Garden Seeds

Yellow/white Heritage Beet

This is the first of my Seedy Saturday, free garden seed giveaway. You must comment directly on this post to be eligible for the drawing for free seeds. Read all of the rules here.

This weeks give away is for seeds for the yellow/white beet shown here. Back around 2003 or 2004 I ordered a packet of mixed Heritage beets from Bountiful Gardens. When I grew them out there were a couple of really huge white beets and a large slightly pale yellow one (as near as I remember now; of course I didn't write anything down at the time....). I saved seeds from these beets in 2005.

Beet Seeds

So the seeds are on the old side, but they had good germination this fall. I would like to get these out into the world so others can enjoy them.  I would plant them a little thicker than you would fresh seed. Most of the seeds will sprout, but they will only sprout one plant, not multiples like when they are really fresh, at least that is what happened with my planting this year. There is some variation in the color of the beets, some are more of a pale pink. But they usually grow pretty large and are very sweet, not nearly as 'earthy' as some varieties. Also, even when large the tops are sweet and yummy also.

Hopefully whoever receives these seeds will also save some seed and send them out into the world. I am sending out a good size handful of seed, about half of the seed I have left from 2005. I'll be planting more myself and collecting some fresh seed next year.

I am thinking about getting one of those linky widgets to add to the Seedy Saturday posts so that if you also have some seeds to give away you could join in with me. If there is any interest in doing this then please let me know. I envision lots of us with extra seed sending them out into the world and spreading and saving valuable varieties of vegetables, flowers and fruits from extinction.