I always feel the need to offer more than swiss chard and kale ... those two stalwarts of the veggie world. Swiss chard and kale ... spring, summer, fall and winter. How much can one really eat without getting abysmally bored?
When the beets come in then there is the variation of beet leaves. Mizuna has also offered welcome relief.
I think we are getting better at offering a wider range of leafy veggies.
This year we were able to extend our growing season by doing early plantings of spinach, which did very, very well indeed. We also planted patchoy which was more of a challenge.
We planted the smaller Toy Choy variety which I have found, after numerous attempts, bolts very quickly.
For the first time, as we move towards fall, I planted "Shanghai patchoy", a larger "White Stemmed Patchoy" (name unknown) and once again the "Toy Choy" variety.
What was amazing was to see the seeds I had planted on Sunday already germinated by Tuesday! Unfortunately, I planted the two larger varieties in the 100 cell trays which proved to be too small and stressed the seedlings out. On top of that, something ate most of the seedlings! I planted the smaller variety in slightly larger cells and those did very well. I planted the smaller variety out yesterday. We'll see if it bolts.
I will do another round of patchoy shortly.
Tuesday, August 9, 2011
Fall Succession Planting ...
To keep the garden productive into fall we have be planting successions of different varieties.
Lettuce and salad mixes have been ongoing all season. We have replanted about six times so far. The goal is to always have more salad coming up.
We have done about five successions of radishes as well. Cauliflower we have planted as three successions and two of broccoli. This also allows some variety in what we can offer to the customer. So we may have cauliflower in the box for two weeks followed by cabbage the next time.
In spring we planted patchoy and spinach, as they enjoy the cooler weather.
I may have done so too early, as we are getting some hot summer days now, but yesterday I planted some patchoy seedlings.
We have also planted one of the beds in onions, two varieties a red onion and Walla Walla onions. The plan is to cover the bed with plastic hoops over winter, just to keep excessive rain off, so the onions don't rot and perhaps raise the temparature a bit. In spring we should be able to harvest onions for our early season box. Well, that's the plan, anyway.
Lettuce and salad mixes have been ongoing all season. We have replanted about six times so far. The goal is to always have more salad coming up.
We have done about five successions of radishes as well. Cauliflower we have planted as three successions and two of broccoli. This also allows some variety in what we can offer to the customer. So we may have cauliflower in the box for two weeks followed by cabbage the next time.
In spring we planted patchoy and spinach, as they enjoy the cooler weather.
I may have done so too early, as we are getting some hot summer days now, but yesterday I planted some patchoy seedlings.
We have also planted one of the beds in onions, two varieties a red onion and Walla Walla onions. The plan is to cover the bed with plastic hoops over winter, just to keep excessive rain off, so the onions don't rot and perhaps raise the temparature a bit. In spring we should be able to harvest onions for our early season box. Well, that's the plan, anyway.
Tuesday, August 2, 2011
2011 Garlic Harvest ...
We planted our garlic in October and finally pulled it out the ground in late July.
We planted two varieties a hard neck variety called "Music". I bought the garlic seed at the Steveston Farmers' Market from a Cawston farmer. the soft neck variety was the Spanish Roja we had put aside last year from our harvest.
I learnt that the hard neck makes a flower but the soft neck does not. I also learnt that you know that the hard neck is ready when the flower stalk unfurls from corkskrew curl to straight. The soft neck you know when the leaves start to die back and turn brown.
We got a great harvest of garlic out of our CSA garden. Some for clients, some for seed and if there is any left at the end of the season, some for the "farmers".
We planted two varieties a hard neck variety called "Music". I bought the garlic seed at the Steveston Farmers' Market from a Cawston farmer. the soft neck variety was the Spanish Roja we had put aside last year from our harvest.
I learnt that the hard neck makes a flower but the soft neck does not. I also learnt that you know that the hard neck is ready when the flower stalk unfurls from corkskrew curl to straight. The soft neck you know when the leaves start to die back and turn brown.
We got a great harvest of garlic out of our CSA garden. Some for clients, some for seed and if there is any left at the end of the season, some for the "farmers".
Our Clients ...
Some of our clients are second year customers and we are grateful.
These are hard core believers in local, organic, fresh and sustainable. We are too!
One of our clients arrives on her bike to collect. Even returns the string we used to tie the bundles so we can reuse them.
We have a couple of Mums with young children. The children come to the garden and help choose their share by following the weekly list and put the items in the shopping box.
I enjoy giving the kids the tour. I think their Mums are giving them a great learning experience when they bring them to the garden. I hope they remember the experience fondly. Having seen food growing it won't be much of a stretch to growing their own food in the future.
These are hard core believers in local, organic, fresh and sustainable. We are too!
One of our clients arrives on her bike to collect. Even returns the string we used to tie the bundles so we can reuse them.
We have a couple of Mums with young children. The children come to the garden and help choose their share by following the weekly list and put the items in the shopping box.
I enjoy giving the kids the tour. I think their Mums are giving them a great learning experience when they bring them to the garden. I hope they remember the experience fondly. Having seen food growing it won't be much of a stretch to growing their own food in the future.
Baby beets · Baby turnips · Nugget potatoes · Kale · Swiss Chard · Radish · Zucchini · Salad mix · Herbs (basil, dill, chives) · Garlic scapes
The contents of our 1st Summer CSA box on the 6th July.
That week I commented:
"The sugar snap peas have begun flowering! And we can look forward to their crisp sweet, crunch soon!"
Towards the end of July we were starting to feel like farmers ... for the first time we tried growing cauliflower, cabbage and broccoli in this garden. We have managed to successfully do three successions of cauliflower ... and Oh! what cauliflower.
I learnt something about broccoli this year ... it takes much longer to produce than the cauliflower. We were harvesting our second go around of cauliflower and it was only this Sunday that I finally saw little broccoli heads shaping up!
Luc is great at projecting quantities. He projects how much we will need to satisfy X customers over X number of weeks and plants accordingly. Particularly useful for the veggies that take a long time to grow such as potatoes and carrots. He worked our that he could safely harvest one square meter of potatoes a week and would have enough potatoes for the whole season. So far customers get 1 1/2 lbs. of potato each.
Some of the veggies are so colourful such as the carrots, beets and radishes ... a visual feast!
Wherever possible, we try to include a bunch of flowers. What we call a "laigniap" in Trinidad, which usually refers to the last, unexpected preganancy. A little extra. A surprise gift. Better know as the "baker's dozen" in this part of the world.
There is food for the belly and food for the heart. We try to satisfy both!
The contents of our 1st Summer CSA box on the 6th July.
That week I commented:
"The sugar snap peas have begun flowering! And we can look forward to their crisp sweet, crunch soon!"
Towards the end of July we were starting to feel like farmers ... for the first time we tried growing cauliflower, cabbage and broccoli in this garden. We have managed to successfully do three successions of cauliflower ... and Oh! what cauliflower.
I learnt something about broccoli this year ... it takes much longer to produce than the cauliflower. We were harvesting our second go around of cauliflower and it was only this Sunday that I finally saw little broccoli heads shaping up!
Luc is great at projecting quantities. He projects how much we will need to satisfy X customers over X number of weeks and plants accordingly. Particularly useful for the veggies that take a long time to grow such as potatoes and carrots. He worked our that he could safely harvest one square meter of potatoes a week and would have enough potatoes for the whole season. So far customers get 1 1/2 lbs. of potato each.
Some of the veggies are so colourful such as the carrots, beets and radishes ... a visual feast!
Wherever possible, we try to include a bunch of flowers. What we call a "laigniap" in Trinidad, which usually refers to the last, unexpected preganancy. A little extra. A surprise gift. Better know as the "baker's dozen" in this part of the world.
There is food for the belly and food for the heart. We try to satisfy both!
RUF up and running for another year ... 2011
Luc and I are doing the CSA on our own this year, concentrating all our experience and efforts in one large back yard garden. Arzeena has better and bigger farms to worry about as she has bought her own farm in Courtnay, BC.
We have benefitted greatly from our early association with Arzeena who was one of the founding members of Richmond Urban Farmers.
This year, as everyone is aware, got off to a slow start ... as I mentioned to our CSA members in our first correspondance of the 2011 season.
"We now have two years experience under our belts and look forward to year three with enthusiasm.
Despite a very cold and wet spring (due to the influence of La Nina, they say) we have been chomping at the bit as the days roll by. Luc and I have begun the process of preparing the garden and should the weather cooperate we will be bringing in the composted manure and roto-till this week.
Anticipating a later start this year, we have started seeds indoors (see attached photos). You can see that they are doing very well. This will enable us to catch up and have well established seedlings in the soil as soon as the beds are ready and hopefully, soon there after, on your plate, on schedule."
Whipping the beds back into shape after many months of rain and weeds is a sorry way to start the year ... it is certainly a test of ones resolve. It fell to me and any family members I could rope in, to take on the onerous task of weeding. Then I went away for a few weeks, on a search for land and when I came back Luc and his buddies had rototilled, brought in a truck load of manure and sand and restored order. It was as if a fairy godfather had waved his magic wand. I came back to this ...
Back to me now to plant out hundreds of cool weather seedlings ... patchoy, spinach and lettuce.
We were determined this year to push boundries and see how much more we could grow.
We had committed to 10 weeks of summer CSA boxes for 4 clients and we wanted to see if we could be more productive with the resources available to us.
We started by seeing how early we start growing food. That was a good place to begin because we were able start offering small harvests as early as the end of May. That first box had lettuce, patchoy, spinach and herbs.
We continued with larger harvests each week for a total of 5 early season harvests. By the 2nd box we had included gailan and a salad mix. By box 3 we had added swiss chard and radishes. In Box 4 we included mizuna, rhubarb and garlic scapes.
Five weeks in we had this to tell our CSA clients:
"Luc and I did a tour of the garden this afternoon, inspecting the progress of the potatoes (too small to even call “nuggets”), beets (need to fill out) and sugar snap peas (not even flowering as yet but that can happen very quickly) and we report the this week will be a fifth “Early Season Box” as these veggies are not ready as yet. So we find ourselves betwixt and between; on the tail end of spring but not fully into summer. Mother Nature leads … and we, her obedient attendants, … follow." ... that week we were able to add kale to the box.
The Early Season Boxes were an exercise in pushing our own knowledge and capabilities and we are pleased with the lessons and skills we learnt!
We have benefitted greatly from our early association with Arzeena who was one of the founding members of Richmond Urban Farmers.
This year, as everyone is aware, got off to a slow start ... as I mentioned to our CSA members in our first correspondance of the 2011 season.
"We now have two years experience under our belts and look forward to year three with enthusiasm.
Despite a very cold and wet spring (due to the influence of La Nina, they say) we have been chomping at the bit as the days roll by. Luc and I have begun the process of preparing the garden and should the weather cooperate we will be bringing in the composted manure and roto-till this week.
Anticipating a later start this year, we have started seeds indoors (see attached photos). You can see that they are doing very well. This will enable us to catch up and have well established seedlings in the soil as soon as the beds are ready and hopefully, soon there after, on your plate, on schedule."
Whipping the beds back into shape after many months of rain and weeds is a sorry way to start the year ... it is certainly a test of ones resolve. It fell to me and any family members I could rope in, to take on the onerous task of weeding. Then I went away for a few weeks, on a search for land and when I came back Luc and his buddies had rototilled, brought in a truck load of manure and sand and restored order. It was as if a fairy godfather had waved his magic wand. I came back to this ...
Back to me now to plant out hundreds of cool weather seedlings ... patchoy, spinach and lettuce.
We were determined this year to push boundries and see how much more we could grow.
We had committed to 10 weeks of summer CSA boxes for 4 clients and we wanted to see if we could be more productive with the resources available to us.
We started by seeing how early we start growing food. That was a good place to begin because we were able start offering small harvests as early as the end of May. That first box had lettuce, patchoy, spinach and herbs.
We continued with larger harvests each week for a total of 5 early season harvests. By the 2nd box we had included gailan and a salad mix. By box 3 we had added swiss chard and radishes. In Box 4 we included mizuna, rhubarb and garlic scapes.
Five weeks in we had this to tell our CSA clients:
"Luc and I did a tour of the garden this afternoon, inspecting the progress of the potatoes (too small to even call “nuggets”), beets (need to fill out) and sugar snap peas (not even flowering as yet but that can happen very quickly) and we report the this week will be a fifth “Early Season Box” as these veggies are not ready as yet. So we find ourselves betwixt and between; on the tail end of spring but not fully into summer. Mother Nature leads … and we, her obedient attendants, … follow." ... that week we were able to add kale to the box.
The Early Season Boxes were an exercise in pushing our own knowledge and capabilities and we are pleased with the lessons and skills we learnt!
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