Peas and Beans

The peas are GONE. I yanked them out and hung the plants up to dry. In a few days I'll go out and remove the pods from the vines and shell the peas. I definitely did not get a lot of pounds out of my peas this year, but it was entirely because I wasn't out there picking them every couple days. I should have been snacking on peas at least once a day. Instead, the peas got too old and now they'll be dried peas that I can put into soups and what not.



In their place, I've planted beans. I was having trouble deciding what kind of beans to plant because I would like to grow a variety that I can use in soups and chilis and what not, in addition to the typical "green bean" varieties. I looked for awhile at buying several packages of bean seeds, but since I only wanted a few of each type of bean, I decided the best option was to just buy a bag of mixed soup beans from the store and grow those!

I soaked them for two nights, by which time they all had little roots sticking out of them. On Wednesday, I took them out and planted them right along the fence where the peas used to be, using 3" spacing and trying to mix up the varieties as much as possible. A couple beans are already starting to show some leaves. It will be very exciting to see how the variety looks as it grows!

Peas!

The peas have gone crazy this past week. I harvested some snap peas as a breakfast snack, and there are loads of snow peas on the vines. I'm so glad they are doing so well, since I am beginning to think about how I will have to pull them soon to make room for summer beans. I was worried they were a waste of time and effort for only a couple handfuls of peas. But if they keep producing like this for another week or two, I'll feel like I'm definitely getting my time's worth out though.


Tonight's plan is to make some sort of meat w/ snow peas asian dish to use up some of those snow peas before they get too big and I have to use them as shelling peas.

Assorted Update

Lots of things have happened in the last couple days. Here's the breakdown.

Tomato Bed:
The Hawaiian Currant made the transition back into dirt well and is beginning to put on some height. Given how miserable it looked when I picked it up, broken and wilted, off the ground a few weeks ago, I am shocked that it made such a recovery.

Hawaiian Currant looking good!

Green Zebra is still looking a little sad. I hacked it pretty good to remove a bunch of wilting leaves. The good news is that the brown wilt seems to be gone. The bad news is that there is only one growing tip left (until it grows a few suckers) and its leaves are somewhat curled, as if to protect itself or reserve water. I think it will be fine eventually, but it's not recovering easily.

Green Zebra...not looking good

The other tomatoes all have yellow flowers, and several are working on making tomatoes. Black Plum and Sun Gold both have lots of little green fruits. I'm curious to see who ripens first. Considering how well Black Plum did last year on neglect, and how well it's doing again this year, I suspect it will cement its position as favorite tomato.

Sun Gold tomatoes


Black Plum tomatoes

I put about 1 lb of E.B. Stone’s All-Purpose Fertilizer into the tomato bed. I also sprayed the bed with Neem Oil and sprinkled some Sluggo in the area. The tomato plants don’t seem too bug infested, but my poor pepper plants are just getting munched (except the Dulcettas, which somehow seem immune), I suspect by slugs & snails.

I bought a replacement Cayenne pepper to replace the one that got munched. It came in a 4-pack, so the others will probably go in pots. I also bought an Anaheim pepper. The one in the garden got so munched that I’m not sure it’ll make it, so I thought it best to have a plant on reserve just in case.

Anaheim Pepper might recover if the slugs stay away


Dulcetta Pepper looking awesome


Shallots (and one shallot that is probably not a shallot)


Garlic (Borage in upper left corner)

Legumes:
The pea plants look great. It’s going to break my heart when I have to pull them out in a couple more weeks. I’ve harvested about a dozen peas and there’s at least that many left on the vine for a salad or stir fry this week.

Very tall Pea plants


Peas

The fava beans are also doing well. There are several pods growing, and lots of flowers that should lead to bean pods soon.

Fava plants


Fava Beans

Leafy Greens:
Chard has taken over the garden. I really need to eat more chard. Lettuce looks fantastic. I think I’ll try to nurse it to the end of June for a BBQ on the 26^th, and then I’ll pull it out to give more room to the melon and strawberry plants. The Asian greens have also outgrown their welcome. I think they will become Chinese Chicken Salad this week. Mmmmm.

Red Chard


Asian Greens

Fruit:
A few of the melons have finally taken hold and appear to be growing. The ones closer to the back get much less sun, so they will take longer to get going, but I’m not sure having a delay between the plants will be a bad thing later this summer.

Charentais Melon

I finally got the 4 Chandler strawberry plants in the ground. Two of them already have strawberries trying to grow. Hopefully the others will get going soon.

Chandler Strawberry

Squash:
The zucchini plants are GIANT. I will have to hack it back a bit to get the corn in, but I doubt the plants would even notice. There are a couple zukes on it that will have to get eaten soon before they get huge. The other squash plants are doing well too. There are acorn squashes forming on one plant and the other squashes seem to have finally sunk their roots in and started growing.

Zuchinni growing


Acorn Squash

Other:
Radish seeds have sprouted out in the garden. Hopefully they’ll also be ready for salad for my BBQ in 3 weeks.

Radish sprout

The sunflowers have also grown quickly. I don't think I've mentioned them much in earlier posts, but the tallest is now taller than me.

Sunflower corner

My corn seeds have sprouted (all but one) in their little newspaper pots. When they reach ~6 inches tall, I’ll move them out to the garden.

Corn sprouts

Assorted Update

More peas are growing, I've harvested about a dozen now. I'm saving some on the vines now for using in stir frys along with the asian greens. I will have to pull out the pea plants towards the end of June, and I'm sure it won't be easy. They will still have a lot of life in them, but they need to make way for summer vegs.

Fava beans are continuing to develop, I just hope they hurry it up before it gets too hot in July.

Tomato plants are coming along. The Hawaiian Currant made the transition well and is beginning to grow up. The Green Zebra plant still has not recovered from when I hacked away the yellowing leaves. Its leaves are somwhat wrapped up, as if it is trying to protect itself, and it hasn't been growing. Much of this is probably to do with the fact that I had to remove all but one growing tip. I am hoping some suckers grow soon so I can get a couple vines going. I would be surprised if the Green Zebra didn't make it through this, but it's a slow recovery. Most of the other plants have flowers and many have little green tomatoes. The Sun Gold and the Black Plum both are tied for best growing plants. I am curious to see which ripens first, though they both have plenty of green fruits and neither seems to show any interest in changing color yet. With Black Plum doing so well again this year, I suspect it will yet again be my favorite tomato.

I went to Armstrong Nursery again this past week and picked up a couple more herbs (Lemon Verbena, cinnamon basil, among others), a cucumber plant, an eggplant, a 15 lb bag of E.B. Stone all purpose fertilizer, Sluggo, and neem oil. I also picked up a packet of lime basil seeds, which I'd never seen before.

With my new supplies, I fertilized/Sluggoed/neemed the tomato bed. The neem oil has a snazzy hose nozzle attachment that dilutes as spray, so I got a little excited and neemed the other plant bed too. Hopefully the sluggo and neem will keep my poor little pepper plants from getting eaten. Almost all of them are getting munched, except for the Dulcettas. They seem to be immune.

I also planted marigolds and chandler strawberries in the other plant bed....this chore is LONG overdue.

More New Beginnings

I spent a chunk of my morning making small newspaper pots to start my corn seeds! Corn is always exciting to me because it was the flagship in my family's garden as a child. I will be planting corn along with beans between my already planted squash in a Three Sisters Garden. In this arrangement, the corn provides support for the beans, the beans provide nitrogen fixing for the heavy feeding corn and squash, and the squash grows around the base of the corn and beans providing shade (and therefore more moisture) for their roots and protecting them from animals with their prickly leaves and stems. This arrangement also allows for an efficient spacing of plants; I hope to have about 30 corn and bean plants planted by mid summer. The newspaper pots should provide a good nursery for my corn plants that will break down once I transplant the sprouts into the garden. The corn seeds are soaking as I right (and have been since this morning) and they'll go into their little pots this afternoon or tomorrow morning.

Other new beginnings are everywhere. My pea plants have just started to blossom, the fava beans have blossoms EVERYWHERE, almost every tomato plants has little yellow flowers, and even my boysenberries have a few white flowers to show off for summer. The carrot seeds I planted a few weeks back have finally started to sprout. The asian greens and mesclun I planted with them didn't fare so well, with only a half dozen or so mustard greens sprouting. But summer is fast approaching and the greens will get bitter with the heat, so it's not much loss. Perhaps I didn't water enough, or the seeds were too old (I bought them in 2009).

Plans for this week are to put in the pepper and strawberry plants I bought last week, seed the corn, seed more radishes and beets, and tie up the tomatoes and fava beans which have outgrown their last set training ties.

Elliott didn't kill any plants!

Last Wednesday I put my tomatoes, garlic, and shallots in in a hurry so that I could leave town for a visit with my mother. I was rather nervous about leaving my garden because many of the seeds I put in over the last few weeks are just now sprouting, others have been up for awhile but are still small and tender, and the process of transplanting tomatoes is pretty brutal for the poor guys and they're very fragile for the first week or two afterwards.

Well, I couldn't be happier to see my tomatoes are for the most part looking no worse than the day I put them in. Elliott reports that they were pretty wilted while I was gone, but they seem to look fine now. I put E.B. Stone Planting Compost on them today as a mulch because the ground is a bit cracked in some places. Hopefully a little mulch will hold the moisture in (and makes the bed look much prettier).

Several garlics have already broken through the surface. I suspect the others will all be up in the next week or so. No shallots or elephant garlic yet, but it has only been 5 days.

My fava beans look FANTASTIC! Many of the plants are 6+ inches tall now and growing second and third stalks. The peas (sweet, snap, and snow) are all popping up. They vary in height from 1/2"-3" right now and a few sweet peas have started growing tendrils.

More strawberry starts have grown leaves. Maybe 8 or 10 have a leaf or two on them now, and a couple of those already have multiple leaves. The larger of my two rhubarb starts also has a beautiful green leaf that grew while I was away.

Seeds are sprouting all over the strawberry/flower/vegetable bed. My sunflower seeds are up and working on their first true leaves. I have a nice row of chard developing and a number of other seeds that I don't yet recognize. Many of these seeds are probably weeds, but I won't really know until they've developed a little further. I won't pull anything for awhile for fear of pulling out something I planted on purpose.

My potted Roma tomato is looking suprisingly stocky. It is close to a foot tall now and has an impressively thick stem with dense branches. I suspect I will have a very productive plant....hopefully in contrast with my tomatoes from last year which ended up long and somewhat spindly.

Today I went to Armstrong Garden Center to spend one of my Groupons from a couple weeks back. I spent it on three bags of compost and a variety of herbs (trailing rosemary, English thyme, chocolate mint, stevia, Italian oregano), an Artichoke plant, and a half dozen seed packets. Most of these (except the seeds) will end up in pots on my porch or driveway window sill. I'm looking forward to getting those all in over the next few days!

More plants!

Finished double digging the north vegetable bed today! It was late in the day but I convinced myself I needed to get the peas in...and now I'm glad I did. There's a roughly 20 foot row of peas with 3" spacing, alternating one snap pea to every two snow peas. This is partly because there were more snow pea seeds in a packet and partly because the plants only grow half as tall so I figure I'll need more of them to get roughly equal yields. the peas should be up in no time. They were all sprouting roots and stems already (from being between wet paper towels for 5 days) and I didn't bury them very deep.

I also planted a dozen or more sunflower seeds and two rhubarb starts.

If I have time tomorrow I'm hoping to get tomatoes, scallions, garlic, and shallots in...or at least dig a bed for them and plant on Monday or Tuesday.

Almost all the Favas have sprouted and sweet peas are pushing through here and there. Three strawberry starts have green in them and the seeds I planted among the strawberries may be starting to germinate as well! They could just be weed seeds, but at least some of the look like beet or chard seedlings. Only time will tell.


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