Planting potatoes

It's the time of year to plant potatoes.  This year the spuds were planted in the trapezoidal bed, which is an oddball bed that is wider than the other beds.  It's 65 inches wide, which is enough for three rows of potatoes. 

On Monday I spread some compost on the bed.  The compost is about half finished, but for potatoes it was good enough.  I removed about a third of the compost from the bin to get to the center of the bin, and took out a heaping wheelbarrow load for the potato bed.  This was an opportunity to mix and stir the remaining compost well.  There's still some dry spots and too wet spots in the compost, and mixing everything spreads the moisture and adds oxygen which will help speed the decomposition.  Doesn't look like much, but any compost helps.

Later I turned over everything with a shovel.  I was a little surprised that the soil in this bed was very friable and easy to turn over.  It's one of the newer beds and hasn't received as much organic matter as the older beds.  Nevertheless there is enough organic matter in the soil to keep the clay portion from aggregating. 

Once the soil was spaded over I went through it with the little power cultivator, then raked it smooth. This bed is wide enough for three rows of potatoes instead of the normal two.  I marked out the rows and made three trenches with a garden hoe. A handful of fertilizer and a bit of bone meal was sprinkled in each trench.

The potatoes, which had been dusted with sulfur, were set in the bottom of the trenches about a foot apart, six per row.  I planted one row of Irish Cobbler and two rows of Red Pontiac.  Red Pontiac is the top performer here, as well as being a very good all around potato.  I like to plant a little of another variety along with them. 

The mounds were pulled into the trenches and the whole affair raked smooth.  Finally I sprinkled some sulfur dust on top of the soil.  For some reason an animal, probably a squirrel or rabbit, likes to dig into the soft ground and look for the potatoes, which it won't touch because of the sulfur.  I've found that a little bit of sulfur on top discourages the critters from investigating.  And besides the soil here is too alkaline.

The small triangle that was left was seeded with carrots.

Playing Catch-up

Not referring to the condiment here, it's a matter of catching up to the typical planting schedule after an exceptionally long winter.  I also have to catch up on posts because I haven't posted in about two weeks.  There's been a lot of things to do, like building a rabbit hutch and restocking the pond after the total fish kill.  Then there's the biggest obstacle to posting - I don't have internet access at home.

That's right, I live in the boonies and my options are dialup, which doesn't work, and satellite internet.  Every time I think about getting satellite internet I go online (at the library or coffee shop) and read all the negative reviews from users and decide it's not worth it.  Of course in our enlightened corporate brave new world forming a public internet system will probably invite a lawsuit from a big corporate internet provider.  Seems that corporations are now entitled to their profits and any public action that might deny our wonderful job creating corporations their due dollars and possibly force the CEO to buy a bit smaller yacht is reason enough to litigate.  So I go to the library, which no corporation has sued.  Yet.

But back to gardening.  Typically I get the first overwintered spinach about the middle of March.  This year the spinach is just now producing.  The lettuce in the Earthbox in the mobile coldframe is doing well. I harvested a nice batch a week ago, and today got another nice picking.  It looks like oak leaf and bibb. 

Most of the pepper seedlings have been moved out to the coldframe now.  It can easily keep the temperatures inside above freezing during a light frost.  That leaves room under the lights indoors for the new seedlings and I don't have to put in an additional light unit.  I've moved the young brassica and lettuce seedlings out to the coldframe also.  The strawberries are extras and I'll try to give them away.

These are the seedlings inside.  I repotted one 6-pack of tomatoes into 5" pots (drinking cups) and will repot the other 6-pack soon.  They will be moved out to the coldframe later this week.  Usually I just buy tomato seedlings but the greenhouses start them way too early and they are rootbound by the time it's ready to set them out.  So this year I bought seeds - a sauce variety called Pompeii, http://www.smartgardener.com/plants/169-tomato-pompeii/overview and a French hybrid for eating called Crimson Carnello, http://www.groworganic.com/renee-s-garden-tomato-crimson-carmello.html.  Both are F1 hybrids with VF resistance (important to me), indeterminate and from Renee's seeds.  An impulse buy.

In the beds things are coming along.  The onions and garlic are doing well.  The cole crops are growing slow but growing.  Strawberries are looking good.  Still waiting for the asparagus to pop up. 

And the spinach is finally starting to produce.  I've picked 5 ounces so far this year.  Break out the champagne!

And my two apple trees both have fruiting spurs this year.  I'll have to thin them but should get a few apples this fall.  The Fuji has a beatiful shape.  If only the Golden Delicious looked this good.

Planting asparagus

The weather is fantastic, but I keep thinking that it's all a trick.  I'm sure that any day the temperature will plummet and 8 inches of snow will fall.  I know that winter is over but can't quite convince myself.  Sure the hostas are sending up shoots, birds are everywhere, the grass is green, and still it seems like winter is going to come back for a last hurrah.  It was a bad bad winter.

Today I finished the new bed by planting asparagus and strawberries.  Two days ago I removed the top six inches of soil from this bed and piled it in a nearby empty bed.  Then I made a V-shaped trench in this bed.  This morning I dumped two bags of compost into the trench and spaded it over, mixing it in well. 

Then I got to work on the pile of soil that will be used to cover the asparagus crowns.  I shoveled about half of it into the garden cart and mixed in a bag of compost.  Thank goodness for garden tractors and carts, because I'm getting too old to wheelbarrow all this soil around.

Back to the asparagus bed.  I added about 2/3's of a pound of bone meal into the trench then mixed it in with a hoe.  I checked the depth of the trench.  Most of the advice I've read recommends planting the all male Jersey asparagus about 6 inches deep.  The deepest part of the trench was about 8 to 9 inches deep in this photo.

Then I hoed in dirt from the side of the trench to fill in the V and make a flat area about 6 inches deep.  I planted the crowns 16 inches apart and spread the roots out, then pulled in a little dirt from the side of the trench to hold them in place.  No I don't have any pictures of the crowns in the soil but trust me they are in there.  Then I filled over the crowns with the soil/compost mix in the cart. This filled the bed to within about an inch or two of the top.  I'll wait for the shoots to appear then put the remaining soil back into this bed.

Then it was time for the strawberries.  I dumped a bag of compost over the area to be planted in berries.  That little rock on the bed border marks the point where the asparagus planting ends.  The compost was turned over and mixed into the soil.  I don't know if strawberries will do well here, it's a clayey soil and somewhat alkaline, but being a raised bed it is well-drained. 

These are everbearing strawberries (Tribute) and are supposed to be planted about a foot apart.  I set up a diagonal planting pattern to maximize the space. This allowed for 12 plants.  If I had planted them in a block pattern there would have been room for only 8 plants.

The strawberry plants were set in.  The bed was finished. 

I wasn't finished yet.  I seeded parsnip in a 4'x4' space, and transplanted a set of brassicas.  At this point two beds are completely planted, one with asparagus/strawberries/herbs and another with onions/parsnip.  The greens bed is about half-filled with lettuce and spinach.

 
And the brassicas are starting to fill out.  It's coming along, and I don't think winter will be back for a while.

A Hot Pile

The late departure of winter means I have to find ways to move things along.  I think the soil temperatures are about three weeks behind what they should be in an average Spring, and I've delayed indoor seed starting schedules a week or more.  The big issue right now is a bin full of unfinished compost.  I really want finished compost for the beds that will grow warm weather crops. The pile has about three weeks to get there.

The good news is - the compost pile is getting hot, which means it's decomposing.  The winter fish kill provided a good supply of dead fish to jump start the compost pile.  I filled a 5 gallon bucket with dead catfish and bluegill and mixed them in with the shredded leaves as the pile was turned over.  Now it's getting hot.  A really hot pile will go over 140 F, but this one is not there yet.  It's at 110 F.   The outside temperature when I checked this was 45 F. 

Amazingly I can't find any of the fish when I turn the pile.  It's like they just vanish.  I'm hoping to get some partly finished compost for the potato bed, which I'll plant in about ten days.  I think by the end of the month the compost should be ready for the remaining beds.  I'd like to see the compost get really hot, hot enough to kill any weed seeds and insect eggs.

The other project for now is to get the new bed ready for asparagus.  I think the soil is still a bit too cold, but I had to get this started.  I dug out about 6 inches of soil and loaded it onto a wheel barrow, then dumped it on a nearby bed for temporary storage.  This bed will get squash and sweet potatoes, so I have plenty of time to move the pile of soil back to the asparagus bed.

With the top layer of soil removed I turned over the deeper soil with a shovel to loosen it.  With the deeper soil exposed it should warm quickly in this sunny weather.  I'll have to purchase some bags of compost to mix in to increase the organic matter in the soil.  Right now it has too much clay and tends to clump.  I'll add some bone meal, make a final trenching and the bed should be ready for asparagus crowns in a few days.

Doing the Mulch/Compost Shuffle

I'm trying to work with the processes of decomposition to get the beds ready for planting by the end of the month if only the compost will finish.  Two beds are up and running.  The greenhouse bed, which no longer has a plastic tent over it, has a good stand of overwintered spinach and lettuce seedlings.  Another bed has onion seedlings and garlic in it, and another bed has the first set of cole crops growing in it.  Both beds got what little compost that was available from the bin.  That leaves five beds that have to be made ready in the next few weeks.

Then there's the new or very recent beds.  The bed I like the best has a stone perimeter.  None of that transient wood border here, it's built to last.  Originally I planned to put raspberries in this bed, but like most of my plans they were changed.  So this bed, built last fall, will get asparagus at one end, perennial herbs at the other, and strawberries in the middle.  But first the cover of shredded leaves had to be removed.  But where to put them?  They will go into that bed at the top of the picture, which will be the new raspberry bed.

Yes the bed is kind of out there in the middle of nowhere, but it's unused space and raspberries aren't that demanding.   I checked Indiana Berry and they don't ship the plants until April 24.  April 24?  Seems kind of late but we have had a late spring.  The bed is on a slope and the stakes hold two long 2x4's that hold back the soil.

So I moved the shredded leaves from the brick-lined bed to this bed and put some landscape fabric over them so they don't blow away.  When the raspberry plants arrive I'll take off the fabric and just move the leaves aside to put in the plants.

The soil is too wet and cold to plant asparagus.  That will probably happen in about a week.  I did get some herbs in the one end - sage, thyme, chives, Mexican oregano and winter savory, and some parsley in another bed.

The mobile coldframe is performing well.  I think it's insulating properties will allow me to move peppers and tomatoes into it in a few weeks, sort of a way stop on the way to the beds.  On nights that have a mild frost the coldframe is able to maintain temperatures around 40 F, well above freezing.  For now there are some extra red onion seedlings, red tropea onions, some extra brassicas and the strawberries biding their time.

The lettuce in the Earthbox is looking good.  Maybe in a week it will be ready.