Harvest Monday - 29 May 2023

This past week I've been living the life of a swingin' bachelor. The Kitchen Goddess is en Paris visiting my sister. It's not like I couldn't have gone; after all, I'm very close to my sister. But someone had to stay and do all the work: planting, weeding, watering, mowing. You know, the swingin' bachelor lifestyle.

For harvests, I cut the first bok choy. I've said before, I find row covers to be a nuisance, but in this case it worked to keep flea beetles out.

'Brisk Green' hybrid bok choy.

I also picked the first radishes. They did not have good germination this year, so the crop will be small.

French Breakfast radishes

I cut some of the last asparagus. This was way more than I could eat this week, so I gave most away.

Asparagus

Simple meals were a part of the aforesaid bachelor lifestyle. I made a soup using miso broth, and added the bok choy, plus mushrooms, scallions, and ramen-style noodles. Quite tasty, and I got two suppers out of it. Also, I've been making salads with our spinach, arugula, radishes, and the last of 2022's red onions. It may look boring, but it makes me feel good to know all the components are home-grown.

Swingin' bachelor salad

In Wildlife Notes, I awoke one morning this week to find the bird feeder next to the kitchen herb garden was lying flat. It had been anchored with a sturdy metal bracket with a spike 15" into the ground. There's only one animal big and powerful enough to do that...a bear.

Bear Attack

It had pried open the two suet feeders on the pole. Fortunately they were not really damaged, nor was the hummingbird feeder. The bracket was toast. Note the wild turkey in the background, inspecting the situation and no doubt hoping there was something left for it. There wasn't. I got a new bracket and put it back up for the hummingbirds. I'm still nervous about putting suet out again. Maybe I'll wait for the bear to move to the next county!

That's it for this week. Thanks for reading, and thanks as always to Dave at HappyAcres.blog for hosting Harvest Monday.

Harvest Monday - 22 May 2023

Greetings from Eight Gate Farm! I always say our springs are unpredictable from a weather perspective, and this year is no exception. In early April we had two days of 85+ degree temperatures (30 C.) And I stupidly neglected to vent the two little mini-greenhouses we have. So all my artichoke, celery, and lettuce seedlings were cooked to death. Then it got cold again. It was warming up fine in the past weeks, but in the wee hours of May 18 we got a true frost, literally a month after our last frost. It was not unexpected, but it still caught a lot of people off guard, people who had rushed to set out their tender crops. Here, we were not affected too much, but it did wither the new leaves on the grape vines. I hope they recover.

Harvests so far have been almost exactly tracking what happened last year at this time. Here's the lineup:

Asparagus

 We've been getting regular cuttings of asparagus, giving us all we really need, and I even gave away some. I think we'll maybe get two more cuttings before I let the spears grow to nourish the plants.

I overwintered spinach again. Only about half the plants made it though the winter, which is pretty good considering the leaf mulch I applied blew away in one of our storms. The hardiness of spinach is amazing.

Over-wintered spinach

I got the first picking of arugula, which was directly sown on April 11. Thus we got the first homegrown salads of the year, very welcome.

Arugula

Finally, I've done three cuttings of chives. We believe the spring chives are tastier than what you get later in the season, so we've been using them fresh and dehydrating a lot. They are now about to flower.

Spring chives

On Thursday I set out all my tomato plants, and this coming week will be a big push to sow beans, and transplant peppers, eggplants, and all the cucurbits. I sure hope the weather holds.

That's all for this week. Thanks for reading, and thanks one again to Dave at HappyAcres.blog for continuing to host Harvest Monday.