September 3, 2012

freshly dug potatoes

My husband and I dug potatoes today. 20 lbs – a good haul. Mostly Burbank Russets. A few Green Mountains and Adirondack Reds. I start digging potatoes, as we need them, a couple weeks after they flower (mid July). I plant the early Reds, Fingerlings, and Butterballs at the front of the bed. I start digging here and then gradually move to the back of the bed to where I planted the keeper potatoes, the Russets and Green Mountains. My Russet tubers are small – as usual. I plant them…

August 9, 2012

onions in storage

Onions were pulled, washed, dried a couple days in the sun, then trimmed and bagged in mesh I saved from supermarket onions. Hanging now in basement. It will only take me a couple months to go through these, so they don’t need to keep very long. Next year I will try for a bigger crop – not necessarily more onions, but bigger ones. That means giving them their own space with no other plants competing for their sunlight. And maybe start the seeds a little earlier. I sowed Feb 25,…

July 15, 2012

today’s harvest

June 27, 2012

truth or myth? you can’t transplant carrots

I heard you can’t transplant carrots because the roots end up crooked. I thought I’d just be very careful to dig a deep hole and straighten the root as I transplanted. Hmmm. No such luck. I had to learn the hard way. I threw out my second batch of seedlings without transplanting them. I will go back to direct sowing. I think carrots (and parsnips) are the only crop I don’t transplant.

May 4, 2012

missed potatoes

While working plot today I found some potato sprouts in last years’ potato bed. Beneath the sprouts, I dug up three spuds. They are so firm and fresh! I’m looking forward to bacon and new potatoes for breakfast.

April 24, 2012

the last of my garden garlic

I only have a few heads of garlic left from last years harvest. They have been delicious! I wish this years crop looked better. I forgot to cover it with salt hay and it looks like this was a mistake. Plus I planted very late. Many cloves didn’t sprout and it looks like its suffered from drying out with the lack of rainfall this spring.

April 18, 2012

time to plant potatoes

My seed potatoes arrived in the mail today. I will see if I can get time tomorrow to start to prepare their bed. I want to gather a few wheelbarrows full of compost from the piles at the edges of our community garden, then turn these under. Then I will dig two long trenches and plant the tubers in these. I ordered four varieties of potatoes from Fedco and they are waiting in the cool basement now for planting. Other updates, we had a super work day at our community…

December 9, 2011

sweet potato sprouts on the window sill

My sweet potatoes I dug last fall finally sprouted this fall. As Donald recommended, I potted them up. They are on my kitchen window sill with cacti and a poinsettia.

November 16, 2011

sweet potato sprouts

Since last fall (Oct 2010 – over a year ago!) I have held a basket of small sweet potatoes to see if they would sprout. Finally it seems they are sprouting. I am thinking about howI can set them up so they will grow inside over this winter. Looks like sweet potatoes may be a biennial crop for me.

November 9, 2011

potatoes

I let the potatoes dry on the counter after I washed the dirt off. Then we made a nice Shepard’s Pie. Potatoes make great comfort food.

weeks and counting until my last spring frost

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