Another summer comes to an end

Garden in early summer

Alas, after 92 days, summer has officially come and gone. As we say goodbye to summer and welcome in fall, I wanted to take a few moments to document my 2013 garden.

I was not able to start seeds as early as I normally do since I spent two weeks out of the country during prime seed starting dates. Nonetheless, this worked out well, because...

The main gardening season got a late start due to a frost that occurred on May 13th - just days after giving away all the extra tomato plants I had grown. I was able to protect the tomato plants I had just planted before the cold weather hit. Luckily, only the tips of the tomato leaves were frost-bitten and the plants were able to survive. However...

Early summer sure was a wet one - the entire east coast was flooded by hard rain for about a month. At first I thought the rain would be good for the newly planted vegetables and fruits, but alas, there is a point where you can get too much water. The tomato plants became infected with leaf spot due to all the wet weather. Fortunately, the tomatoes continued to grow and produce an overabundance of fruit!

Ryan (AKA, Emanuel Labor as he called himself) and I removed two raised beds that were falling apart and he rebuilt me an additional two new 12X5 foot raised beds. My garden now has a total of 240 square feet of space. At first I thought this was not enough (I NEEDED more), but I think I have come to terms with this amount of space. Of course, I do reserve the right to change my mind in future years!

This year has been the best gardening years by far! There are too many successes and very few failures to recap so below are some of the highlights and things for me to remember for next year:

Success:

• Planting heirloom vegetables was a lot easier than I thought. I really didn't have too many issues and the yields were fantastic, the varieties were different, and the taste was the way vegetables are supposed to taste - real. I grew kohlrabi, radishes, broccoli, and potatoes for the first time this year. I probably won't grow kohlrabi again because I had no idea what to do with this strange looking vegetable (and neither did the people I tried to give it to). Radishes were never really my thing, but they were the first vegetable I got to harvest so it brought life to an otherwise cold, wet spring. Broccoli was the BEST! I have to grow more in the future. I am still waiting for potatoes. 

• Throughout the previous year, I had saved every single eggshell. I placed a handful (or two) of crushed eggshells at the bottom of each hole I dug for tomato and pepper plants to prevent blossom end rot. This seemed to have worked out great! I did not have a single tomato or pepper with blossom end rot this year!

• Trenching the tomato plants resulted in a much more sturdy plant - not a single strong wind blew the tomato plants down. In fact, the plants are still standing upright today. At their tallest, the indeterminate tomatoes were well over 11 feet tall. It was at that height that the tomatoes started to bend down by the weight of the fruits, and then come back up to get sunlight. I started calling the tomato plants "tomato trees" because they were so tall (and were missing the lower leaves that were most infected with leaf spot).

• Planting hot peppers in ~ 5 gallon pots on the deck saved valuable real estate and resulted in an earlier and continuous harvest. Potted plants required daily morning/evening watering and monthly fertilization to keep the plants happy.

• When I planted the zucchini, I placed a round tomato cage around the seedlings. This helped to contain the plants, keeping them off the ground, and made harvesting easier since the leaves were upright.

• This year I gave up on the idea of a square foot garden and decided to plant according to the space requirements of each plant. Instead, I practiced less-intensive gardening techniques and focused more on companion planting. Less crowding meant more produce, better quality, and an easier harvest. Boy did this pay off!

• How could I forget, adding the drip irrigation systems was the BEST investment! Installing it during the hottest two days of the year, probably not the best idea given that Ryan and I both got heat stroke and burnt from the sun's rays. By the way, this was proceeded by two weeks of cool wet weather. Hey, how was I supposed to know that!?! If I did, I would have picked different days to do the installation of this big time saver. It all worked out in the end.

• Rabbits - where were all the rabbits? Thanks neighbor!  ;)

Failures (really just learning experiences):

• Planting 10 napa cabbages at the same time = all 10 cabbages needing to be harvested at the same time. Who the heck eats this much cabbage?! If there is a next time, I will spread out the seed starting dates. Also, slugs and pill bugs LOVE cabbage - much more than I do. I may not grow this again in the future as I had to discard half the head because the outer leaves were covered with holes and just not appealing. The extra protein from the surprise baby slug in the middle of the head wasn't fun either.

• I grew potatoes in two 5 gallon pots on the deck. Next year, I will probably grow potatoes in the main garden as planting them in pots was a little hit or miss. One pot did really well, the other died. I am still waiting to harvest the potatoes, but that is my fault for getting them started so late (note to self: next year, start the potatoes in March or April).

• Squash vine borers got me again. At least I harvest some squash before losing all the plants to these suckers.

• My organic approach to fruit trees was the biggest failure. I am really not sure how an organic farmer can successfully grow apples and peaches. The apples got infested with apple maggots, coddling moths, tent caterpillars, and japanese beetles. The peach tree was infested with ants and stink bugs. Next year, I am spraying the fruit trees! I have found a few "organic" options that seemed to have worked this year (although it was too late to save the fruits), but I may not play so nice next year.

What is the grand total for this year's harvest, you ask? Well, I don't know, the garden is still producing!! So far, I have harvested over 670 lbs of produce! That is over 250 lbs more produce than I harvested last year. 

I admit, there was one day in August that I came in from the garden, just after harvesting ~ 90 lbs of tomatoes, looked at all the countertops in the kitchen crowded with produce, and said out-loud, "I am not sure I could be a farmer." It makes me laugh, but I know next year I am going to do this again....and I can't wait! 

The countdown to the days to start next year's seeds begins now.