Harvest Monday

lots of yellow pear and a few others kinds

Hooking up with Dave for Harvest Monday. I missed last week so again this is a two week post.Last week there were some cherry tomatoes. 

half of the beans

Almost 10 pounds of green beans. 

Armenian and Marketmoore cucumbers

Some Marketmoore and Armenian cucumbers. 

yellow patty pans were good again

Of course there were a lot of squash.   There was a good amount of kale, chard and collards but I didn't take new pics. I picked flowers and herbs on Saturday morning but flat didn't have time to take pictures.  I wish I had. I had some nice sunflowers and dahlias and the bouquets sold fast

Thatched cottage bird house

small red poppy birdhouse

Arizona sunset birdhouse

Sunflower birdhouse

Pink roses birdhouse

I painted some of the gourds I grew last year and made birdhouses. They really drew a lot of attention to my booth. The red poppy one has sold already.

This past week was not such a good one around the farm. After our cool rainy weeks it turned really hot and dry. Something, either a rat or squirrel chewed through a sprinkler hose. I lost a couple of squash plants and the rest looked really bad so there were only a few squash.

Then somehow the valve on the drip line to the beans was turned part way off and they didn't get enough water so there were only a couple of pounds of beans. Lost a few plants there too.

I did get a couple of watermelon and a lovely cantaloupe. There were the usual kale, collards and chard to pick, along with herbs.

In another lack of water even the Honey Boat Delicata squash in the front yard bed croaked and I picked all the squash. I tried one, cooked in the microwave and was not impressed so I didn't take it to market. I don't know if it was too green and needs to sit and sweeten up or if it was the microwave cooking. I'll wait awhile and try it again, cooked in the oven next time.

RIP Bacon boy

And in sad news I lost my best (and oldest) Buff Orpington cockbird probably a heart issue with the sudden heat wave after the cooler weather. RIP

Harvests week of July 31-Aug 6
July 31
Marketmoore cucumber 1# 8oz
Aug 3
Chard  1# 10 oz
Scarlet kale  3# 9 oz
lancinata kale 1# 10 oz
collards   2# 9 oz
Aug 4
cherry tomatoes  3# 4oz
green beans 9# 11 oz
squash 81# 8oz
Armenian cucumber 13# 1oz
Marketmoore cuke 6# 10 oz

Harvest week of Aug 6-13
Aug 9
Scarlet kale 1# 3oz
Aug 10
Armenian cuke 2#
Black Tail Mt. Watermelon 6#
Marketmoore cukes 4# 14oz
green beans 1# 0oz
Honey Boat Delicata 9# 12 oz
squash 3# 14oz
chard 1# 11oz
scarlet kale 2# 10oz
Aug 11
Beans 3# 6oz
cherry tomatoes 2# 14oz
Marketmoore cukes 2# 11 oz
Armenian cukes 8# 2oz
squash 26# 8oz
sage 1 oz
rosemary 3oz
flat parsley 9 oz
curly parsley 6 oz
cantaloupe 2# 12 oz
squash 3# 8oz
Aug 13
beets without tops 1# 3oz
volunteer potato 7oz

Two week total
Marketmoore cukes 15# 12oz
Armenian                 23# 3oz
greens                       14# 10oz
cherry tomatoes          6# 2oz
green beans               14# 1oz
squash                      111# 12oz
watermelon                6#
cantaloupe                  2# 12oz
herbs                           1# 3oz
beets                            1# 3oz
potato                               7oz
Delicata                       9# 12oz

Total
206# 14oz

Harvest Monday

7 out of 10 varieties of squash

I missed Harvest Monday last week so I will combine things this week. This is a really fun blog hop with participants from around the world. My daughter was visiting from Florida, plus 3 of my grand daughters came to stay and visit with her. Squash production last week was down to just around 20 pounds because the plants had gotten too dry. In fact I've lost about 3 of them. This week we were back up to about 50 pounds with a lot of tiny fruits coming on. The monsoon season has begun and the rain and cooler cloudy days have really revived a lot of plants.

Scarlet Kale

The Scarlet and Lancinato kale have really been producing. I average 5 or more pounds of kale a week. Most weeks I sell all of it, occasionally there will be one bag left over.

Hales cantaloupe

I did finally get some cantaloupe. They were totally ripe, but watery and not very sweet. I blame the rains, they took up too much water.

More Hales

On Sunday I picked more cantaloupe. I ate the smaller two for breakfast and they were much better than the first ones.

a bowl of herbs

I picked a lot of herbs both weeks. The rains are really helping the basil and parsley. Some of the parsley is trying to go to seed but I keep cutting the flower heads out, hoping to keep it going.  

Black Beauty and Black from Tula

Cherry tomatoes were down this week, there were a lot of splits and rots from the rain. Also I think the cooler cloudy days slowed down ripening. I did get some big tomatoes but of course never enough. I'm thinking I need about 100 plants of large tomatoes to satisfy the demand but can't figure out where to plant them all where they would be at least somewhat protected from birds and squirrels and without crowding out some other crops.

Market Moore cucumber

I got a couple of cucumbers. I hope there are a lot next week for the farmers market, people have been asking for them.
'

new potatoes and herbs

home grown chicken

#eatwhatyougrow  On Sunday I used the last of the new potatoes and some fresh herbs left over from market to go with a roast chicken which I cooked way too long. It was good any way. I used a bunch each of flat parsley, curly parsley, Thai basil and some garlic.

Harvests
7-13 carrots 1#  0 oz
        squash 3#   2 oz
        Scarlet kale 4#  4oz
7-14
cherry tomatoes 5# 6oz
large tomatoes   3#  0oz
squash                19#  8oz
TOTAL FOR WEEK JULY 10-16  36# 4oz

7-18
cantaloupe  4# 8oz
cucumber         4oz
7-19
Scarlet kale   4# 4oz
lancinato kale 2#8oz
chard               2# 4oz
7-20
cherry tomatoes 2# 13oz
squash              6#  13oz
7-21
squash             51# 8oz
cherry tomatoes  2# 5oz
carrots               1#
beans                0#    1oz
7-23
cucumber                8oz
cantaloupe          9#  9oz

TOTAL FOR WEEK JULY 17-23  86# 3OZ

Farmer Friday

cleaning up

I cleaned up this bed in the creek side garden this week. I've been holding off planting a lot of stuff, waiting for rain. We got a good rain Monday night so time to get in gear. 

red wigglers

I was really happy to see s lot of earthworms in there. Worms are one of the biggest fertility boosters you have. 

planting seeds

 Later I planted a row of rainbow carrots, a row of turnips and half a row of red and green Mizuna mustard. I couldn't find the rest of my mustard seed so I planted the other half of the row to dill.  I sprinkled some radish seed in with the carrots. 

Scarlet kale

I planted out some Scarlet kale seedlings

Collards

And a few more collards. The ones that I planted before that got a little crispy are looking better. 

driveway bed with lime basil

The lime basil by the driveway has really taken off. I cut them all down to dry. 

bush beans under bird net

The green and yellow beans are doing well.  There weren't even a handful of pods to pick today but they are loaded with flowers and tiny beans. 

Scarlet kale

I picked lots of kale. Cherry tomatoes are way down this week. The plants are loaded with green fruit but there were a lot of splits in the ripe ones. 

erosion control

The storm Monday did some damage to the swale above the new garden so I worked in that a little bit. 

assorted summer squashes

The squash harvest was also down this week. But they are putting out new growth and I see a lot of tiny fruits coming on for next week. 

Market More cucumber

FINALLY!!! A little cucumber!

a bowl of herbs

Lots of herb orders this week. Thai and Italian basil, curly parsley, oregano and sage. 

new potatoes with herbs for roasting

I had some new potatoes set aside for us (sold all the rest already) and roasted them with fresh chopped parsley, sage, basil and oregano. So yummy!

Things are Changing Fast

Last of the spinach

Cucumbers

We are having unusually warm weather here. Many years we have a snow storm roll through at Easter. Well this year we are having 80-85 degree days and 45-50 degree nights. So we are a solid month ahead of schedule. The last patch of spinach was getting aphids from the warm weather so out it came, to be replaced by cucumbers.

pulling out the bolting collards

planting Pak Choy

The collards were bolting and nothing I did would stop them from trying to flower and go back to making leaves. So out they came, to be replaced by some Pak Choy seedlings on one end of the bed and bush beans on the other end.

potato blossoms

The potato plants are growing well and some are blooming. The flowers are pretty and are slightly different colors on each variety.

Summer Bibb lettuce

The Summer Bibb lettuce is really pretty and ready to cut.

blossom on Sweet Magnolia, a purple snap pea

I didn't get the Sweet Magnolia's planted until it was pretty late, but they are finally blooming so there will be purple pods mixed in with the green ones this week or next.

lettuce seedlings tucked under tomato plants

I try to make use of every inch of space so after planting out the tomatoes, I planted lettuce seedlings between  them. The lettuce will be gone long before the tomatoes are too big.

tomatoes on strings

This year I am experimenting with growing tomatoes very intensively. They are planted close together and will be trained up strings and pruned hard. This is supposed to give you more perfect fruits. We shall see.