We ate a beet the size of a softball the other night, 2 beets feed the family... clearly there is meat involved, and spinach and salad and broccoli soup of course. Just so you know I'm not like "OK family sit down and have your plate of beets". That would be silly of course, and silly is not the Portland way... it happens to be weird. Silly is like the dumb version of weird. I see silly as ridiculous and weird more like abnormal, but considering what is normal in this world I'll take weird every time. It's actually fun being weird around an old fashioned knuckle head's because the old fashioned knuckle head has a small mind wrapped around an outdated world view and they think they are right because that's they way they were raised many moons ago no mater what proper logic dictates.
Anyhoo, this is the Man Robertson gardening blog and not the Man Robertson philosophy blog so lets get to the vegetables.
I believe one of my goals was to have a king hell beet harvest, so we can tick that one off the list... probably time for a second planting of beets, I'm sure there is time. On the negative side i might have planted the beets, spinach and carrots too close together, which is kind of a big failure given plant spacing was another goal this year. You see i noticed the carrots trying to go to seed... meaning they were trying to sprout flowers by shooting a long "plant thing" up high and flowering. It was probably their best chance to survive given the garden was going bananas all around them. I picked one of them and it had a very small carrot so i gave it to the kids who washed it and put it in an ice bath, an invention they called a "carrot cooler". After gnawing off the carrot they found what they called the "carrot's bone". I guess the inner core goes hard as the plant shifts to flowering mode... who knew? The good part is that we know now... that is Man Gardening in a nutshell... fuck the research, just slam plants in the ground and see what happens. That's when keen observations skills come in handy. Not all of the carrots went to seed and i harvested all of the spinach and cooked it down in butter and garlic and we wolfed it back. Perhaps now the carrots can shine and turn that deep purple i was promised back in spring when i had a heart full of hope, and perhaps tried to squeeze too much out of the limited real estate.
A pumpkin came up from last years compost from Halloween' and i let it go for a bit but it was like a god damn attack octopus on speed clawing up all of the tomatoes and spiking me left right and center. I tried to train it to the back to climb up that loathsome rose bush but it kept trying to force itself into the prime tomato grounds so i had to end it's reign. When i get the cob house built in the backyard I'll plant a pumpkin next to it next year and it can climb all over that and compete with the Zeus hops, I'm sure the kids would like pumpkins come October, but for now it would cut into me having tomatoes in July, August and September. Basically it just came up in the wrong spot, sometimes you win sometimes you lose, the key is to make the decision beforehand on where you want to win and where you want to lose, and run with it.
We are getting real close to tomatoes... I am getting a few that are starting to show colour thanks to my February indoor starts. Peas are coming to a close and i have many freezer bags full, along with the fact that we have had our fill of peas every day for weeks now. Today i planted rows of blue pole beans amongst the roots of the peas, so that they can grow and climb on the trellis i had build for the peas. Of course they will have to compete with the pickling cucumbers i put there too... that's Man gardening... fire the plants in there and see who rules! Apparently the pea roots are great for fixing nitrogen in the soil so don't pull them out. There will probably be some delicate trimming involved later, but think of that as as way to better get acquainted with what is happening on that level, cause you know when you are in there there will be some weeding you will realize you need to do.
Between broccoli and chard harvests we have our steamed vegetables solved for the summer... potato boxes are waist high and the strawberries are pretty much over. My kids who i nickname "the harvesters" are all over the blueberries but the lone plum will be mine... it's a first year tree... perhaps i should give Kaiya a bite since she helped me pollinate the tree with cue tips. I could probably buy her off with an ice cream, but then if the twins got wind of that there would be hell to pay.
I love this time of year, as i love all times of year, because i am a lover of course, but this time of year just before dinner the kids and I go out to the gardens and decide what we will be having for dinner... they really get into it, and although it's not really free it kind of feels that way. I believe the great life decisions are ones made by seeing what is ready, and not particularly by what you think you want, so we have the perfect vehicle to the life lesson.
With regards to the community garden, i did a lap around the garden tonight and conversed with various gardeners, and there was a slight undertone of a perceived "competition" among garden plots. As i have always said "Gardening is not a competition, but if it can be turned into one to create greater yield then do it". As a strategist i believe that whatever it takes to motivate you to succeed then use it. That said i have to say that the biggest problem i see with plots that are under performing has to do with lack of watering. You need to soak that soil every day, and soak it good... irrigation is really the key to gardening... not that i mind having examples to show my children of plants suffering from drought, but that is what it is. Obviously you can have better soil that will hold moisture better but if you have no moisture you have no game. If i were to be serious i would say to some people "water your garden with 100x more water than you have been and see what happens"... of course not everybody's life is structured around their garden for some reason, which seems weird to me, but that's the way it goes.
The potato box is in front of me and has a few more layers on it now, to the right is the tomato patch and i am currently soaking the peas, soon to be beans and cucumbers.
Anyhoo, this is the Man Robertson gardening blog and not the Man Robertson philosophy blog so lets get to the vegetables.
I believe one of my goals was to have a king hell beet harvest, so we can tick that one off the list... probably time for a second planting of beets, I'm sure there is time. On the negative side i might have planted the beets, spinach and carrots too close together, which is kind of a big failure given plant spacing was another goal this year. You see i noticed the carrots trying to go to seed... meaning they were trying to sprout flowers by shooting a long "plant thing" up high and flowering. It was probably their best chance to survive given the garden was going bananas all around them. I picked one of them and it had a very small carrot so i gave it to the kids who washed it and put it in an ice bath, an invention they called a "carrot cooler". After gnawing off the carrot they found what they called the "carrot's bone". I guess the inner core goes hard as the plant shifts to flowering mode... who knew? The good part is that we know now... that is Man Gardening in a nutshell... fuck the research, just slam plants in the ground and see what happens. That's when keen observations skills come in handy. Not all of the carrots went to seed and i harvested all of the spinach and cooked it down in butter and garlic and we wolfed it back. Perhaps now the carrots can shine and turn that deep purple i was promised back in spring when i had a heart full of hope, and perhaps tried to squeeze too much out of the limited real estate.
A pumpkin came up from last years compost from Halloween' and i let it go for a bit but it was like a god damn attack octopus on speed clawing up all of the tomatoes and spiking me left right and center. I tried to train it to the back to climb up that loathsome rose bush but it kept trying to force itself into the prime tomato grounds so i had to end it's reign. When i get the cob house built in the backyard I'll plant a pumpkin next to it next year and it can climb all over that and compete with the Zeus hops, I'm sure the kids would like pumpkins come October, but for now it would cut into me having tomatoes in July, August and September. Basically it just came up in the wrong spot, sometimes you win sometimes you lose, the key is to make the decision beforehand on where you want to win and where you want to lose, and run with it.
We are getting real close to tomatoes... I am getting a few that are starting to show colour thanks to my February indoor starts. Peas are coming to a close and i have many freezer bags full, along with the fact that we have had our fill of peas every day for weeks now. Today i planted rows of blue pole beans amongst the roots of the peas, so that they can grow and climb on the trellis i had build for the peas. Of course they will have to compete with the pickling cucumbers i put there too... that's Man gardening... fire the plants in there and see who rules! Apparently the pea roots are great for fixing nitrogen in the soil so don't pull them out. There will probably be some delicate trimming involved later, but think of that as as way to better get acquainted with what is happening on that level, cause you know when you are in there there will be some weeding you will realize you need to do.
Between broccoli and chard harvests we have our steamed vegetables solved for the summer... potato boxes are waist high and the strawberries are pretty much over. My kids who i nickname "the harvesters" are all over the blueberries but the lone plum will be mine... it's a first year tree... perhaps i should give Kaiya a bite since she helped me pollinate the tree with cue tips. I could probably buy her off with an ice cream, but then if the twins got wind of that there would be hell to pay.
I love this time of year, as i love all times of year, because i am a lover of course, but this time of year just before dinner the kids and I go out to the gardens and decide what we will be having for dinner... they really get into it, and although it's not really free it kind of feels that way. I believe the great life decisions are ones made by seeing what is ready, and not particularly by what you think you want, so we have the perfect vehicle to the life lesson.
With regards to the community garden, i did a lap around the garden tonight and conversed with various gardeners, and there was a slight undertone of a perceived "competition" among garden plots. As i have always said "Gardening is not a competition, but if it can be turned into one to create greater yield then do it". As a strategist i believe that whatever it takes to motivate you to succeed then use it. That said i have to say that the biggest problem i see with plots that are under performing has to do with lack of watering. You need to soak that soil every day, and soak it good... irrigation is really the key to gardening... not that i mind having examples to show my children of plants suffering from drought, but that is what it is. Obviously you can have better soil that will hold moisture better but if you have no moisture you have no game. If i were to be serious i would say to some people "water your garden with 100x more water than you have been and see what happens"... of course not everybody's life is structured around their garden for some reason, which seems weird to me, but that's the way it goes.
