Monday, September 1, 2014

Harvest Monday - 1 September 2014

Welcome to another Harvest Monday report from Eight Gate Farm. As you already know, Harvest Monday is hosted by Daphne's Dandelions, and we are grateful for the opportunity to participate in it.

For this, the last week of August, the weather finally warmed up to where we would expect it to be, and that has boosted productivity.


There was 6.6 pounds (~3 kg.) of sauce tomatoes on Wednesday, not including the grape tomatoes. We do add those to sauce if we have more than we can eat fresh. Also filet beans and zucchini, both slowing down but not done yet.

And a good handful of Danvers carrots:


On Thursday, another 7 pounds (~3.15 kg.) of tomatoes of all varieties we've planted, again not including grape.
 

There's the first "Rosita" eggplant, of beautiful color. But beware, it has nasty thorns on the calyx! It's an 84-day variety, a little late here, and more than 6 weeks behind the black "Amadeo" variety I've shown in the past, and which is still producing for us. Rosita also has lovely white flesh.

On Saturday we took the last of the spring-sown carrots and beets, as well as zucchini, cucumbers, and a few potatoes for dinner.


Funny story about the beets. They had lost almost all their foliage to something chewing them, and I could not figure out what it was. On a visit the the garden, The Kitchen Goddess came back and told me "goldfinches were eating the beet greens." I really did not believe it until I saw for myself a pair land and begin munching. I did a little research and found this is known behavior for goldfinches. In some areas they're known as "The Salad Bird." As if I don't have enough problems with bugs!

As many others are experiencing, this is a terrible year for tomato blight. All our plants (except the grape) have basically stopped flowering and setting fruit. So what we see out there is what we will get for the season, as they slowly ripen. At this rate, we might have all tomatoes ripen before first frost, something I've never seen before. Here's another large (for us) haul, 18 lbs. (~8.16 kg.).


I picked all the Mt. Hood hops from the two year old vine. It doesn't look like much, but it is easily 5 times what we got last year, so the vine is progressing as it should.


They were dehydrated, vacuum-sealed, and put in the freezer for a future batch of beer. They smelled heavenly.

I'm trying an experiment this summer--growing spring lettuce in semi-shady locations. I set a few seedlings out July 18. The varieties are "Green Ice" and "New Red Fire." As this shows, they are doing very well: tender, delicious, no bitterness. So maybe I don't have to try Summer Crisp to get late summer salads. It's a treat to get our own tomatoes and lettuce at the same time!


On Sunday we picked all our grapevines. While we lost a lot to black rot, we got a much better harvest than last year. Let the winemaking begin!


And another batch of "Honey Select" sweet corn. Not quite at full ripeness, I think, but very tasty nonetheless. But if I keep taking large samples like this there might not be any left!


That's all for this week. Thanks for reading, and happy harvests to all!

16 comments:

  1. Your tomatoes look wonderful! Most of mine are taking their sweet time to ripen too this year and it is a race to see if they will ripen before frost and disease takes them down. I didn't know that goldfinches ate greens. I thought maybe they were after the bugs and worms. Great harvests this week! ~ Grow a Good Life

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    1. Thanks, Rachel! I'm sure this warm spell will speed things along for you.

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  2. Wow! Great looking harvest. You have a great variety for produce. The hops look awesome.

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  3. Nice haul of root vegetables. And interesting about the goldfinches. My problem is a rabbit or vole going straight for the beetroot. And the hops are nice! That's something I'd like to try but don't have the space.

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    1. As long as you have someplace sunny where they can climb, hops really don't take up a lot of room or demand any attention, which is nice.

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  4. Those pesky goldfinches! I knew some birds would eat my young plants in summer but I never caught the ones doing it. I've not grown Rosita eggplant before but I love the white fleshed kinds. I've grown Dancer the last few years and Johnny's has it listed at 65 days. It came on about 2 weeks before the large dark purple Italian types here. And you've got lettuce, tomatoes and corn at once - that sounds wonderful to me!

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    1. I'll have to investigate Dancer. Rosita is awful pretty, but not productive.

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  5. Lovely harvests. And I have to laugh about the birds. I love goldfinches and will leave seedheads on the plants to attract them. But I never knew they ate the salad greens. So far I think they haven't eaten any, but a lot of the greens are covered in my garden. Not the lettuce though.

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    1. Yeah, I was OK with them robbing the sunflower heads, although I leave out plenty of sunflower seed in the feeders, but eating foliage irritates me. That's gardening! Thanks for your compliment.

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  6. I know all to well the salad eating propensities of birds and it's not just the goldfinches. My brassicas are a favorite item and bean leaves seem to be uber delicious, not to mention cucumber and zucchini leaves. You are well ahead of me in the tomato harvests, mine are just starting to ripen and I think I'll be having a short season this year also, there's some sort of fungus quickly killing off the leaves on my plants.

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    1. It's hard to believe I can be ahead of anything you grow in the perfect climate of Carmel Valley!

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  7. Great harvest! I love all of the different colors. Good luck on your hops. It's been while since I've brewed anything.

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  8. So interesting what you said about the gold finches. I have watched my flock nibble on the winter squash leaves all summer - that's ok- but really munch hard on my kale plant too - NOT ok! I have never heard another gardener mention this, so its good to know I am not alone! Very cool about you r hops harvest. I am about 120 miles south of Mt Hood. Hops was a large traditional crop 80 years ago but is coming back strong as microbrewerys request local hops. Happy September!

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    1. Jeez, as if the squash needs any more parasites! I've seen pictures of how they grow hops in your area. Happy September to you, too!

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  9. Lovely carrots - lots of people seem to be harvesting spring sown carrots now; I'm thinking I probably pulled mine too early. I hear you on the blight - this is only my 3rd year with the garden so I'm still not certain of what is or is not typical - so glad that this level of blight is not!

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