Tag: Ozark gardening

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Spring Promises

It’s still February. Officially, spring is a month away at the vernal equinox. So, what is it with spring promises wrapped up in warm temperatures and singing birds?

Garden Fever

My cabbage and leek seedlings don’t mind as they get to spend the day outside in the sunshine. Grow lights may work, but sunlight is so much better.

Snow pea seeds are planted. I’ll have to cover them, if frost threatens. The plants can take some frost, but the seeds don’t germinate well when they get too cold.

Tomato and pepper seeds need to be in pots to be ready for the garden in six weeks. Mine normally take eight as they must share the one grow light. Spring frost dates here are in mid April and may is a wise choice for tomatoes, peppers and squash.

chickens deliver on spring promises
Fancy, an Old Arcana rooster, is dressed in his spring finery and showing off for the hens.

Sure Sign of Spring

Spring promises are easy to find in the hen house lately. The chickens have started laying.

Chickens are long day birds. They generally stop laying in the fall when days get shorter. About six weeks after the winter solstice, the feathered ones start making deposits in the nests again.

I do try to use lights in the winter to keep at least a few eggs arriving every day. This didn’t work out well this past winter. Now, eggs are on the menu again.

Standard cochin hen
Feathers is the last standard cochin hen in the flock. She is over five years old, but still lays an egg now and then.

Winter Promises

February is too early for winter to leave. The spring promises may become nightmares in another week when winter moves back in, laughing at those who fell for those lovely warm days thinking winter cold had gone on extended holiday already.

Impatience

The Ozark weather is famous for its changeability. I’ve lived here long enough to know this.

In spite of the spring promises, I will start seedlings at the usual time, set up the garden at the usual time, tell my impatience to settle down. Spring will get here when it gets here, when winter finally does go on holiday.

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Spring Gardening

It’s amazing how uplifting sun and temperatures above freezing can be after days of near and below zero. The goats and chickens tumble out their doors to bask in the sun. Thoughts turn to kids and spring gardening.

Waiting on Kids

My Nubian doe High Reaches Juliette was due about New Year’s. The days passed and she stayed fat and showing signs, but no kids.

When she looked like any time, the temperatures plunged. Anxiety began as wet kids stand no chance in zero degrees even with an experienced mother goat.

The cold seemed to stop all kid preparation. As this cold moves on, the wait begins anew.

Reading Gardening Books

There’s not much to do outside with cold temperatures and a dusting of snow. Reading about gardening, seed sorting and starting along with spring gardening plans pass the days.

Much of the country is having much worse weather than the Ozarks. That’s one of the reasons we moved here thirty years ago. Waist deep snow along with temperatures ten and twenty below for six months didn’t fit our preferred life style.

My current gardening book “The Country Journal Book of Vegetable Gardening” written by Nancy Bubel is set in Pennsylvania. Some of the crops, all of the timing and some of the problems don’t apply here in the Ozarks. So, why is the book helpful?

Zephyr summer squash
This is definitely on my garden list for this year. Zephyr summer squash is easy to grow, delicious to eat and somewhat tolerant of squash bugs.

Universal Gardening Ideas

Some things fit gardening no matter where the garden is. The author prefers setting out rows. I have marked out beds. But planting seeds is the same.

Pennsylvania gardens are set out later than mine. But spring gardening planning entails the same details for succession planting, mulching, cultivating, seed starting and more.

Much of this and other gardening books won’t apply to the Ozarks. Enough of it does to make reading them worthwhile.

Besides, its relaxing to read about spring gardening while waiting for the season to begin. Now is when the planned garden is beautiful and productive. Before reality sets in.

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Winter Garden

With killing frost ending the summer into fall garden, my winter garden takes over. This year finds it a bit meager thanks to the groundhogs and deer, but there are a few plants left.

Choosing Plants

Cold hardiness is a must for a winter garden. It’s hard to help more sensitive plants survive.

My choices are spinach, turnips, Napa cabbage and carrots. Some others a bit more sensitive include yellow heart cabbage and winter radishes.

Chinese celery likes cool weather, but is not frost hardy. Bok choi is hard to keep too.

Winter Tactics

I use old blankets and towels along with plastic. The main raised bed is set up for a plastic cover. The new raised bed has the beginnings of a cold frame so the blankets and plastic are jury rigged for now.

This round I got caught with some leeks and beets. Luckily the beets are in the same bed as the turnips which are frost tolerant to mid twenties. The forecast is for lower, so all of this bed is covered for a few days.

winter garden strategy
Blankets and plastic may look clumsy and ineffective as winter garden protection, but this picture was taken after a night at eighteen degrees and another at fifteen degrees. The winter radishes and spinach came through just fine. All of my other beds protected in this manner survived well also, no casualties.

The Shade House

Plastic goes over this cattle panel structure turning it into an unheated greenhouse. Although the plastic doesn’t keep the inside from freezing, old towels and blankets protect plants overnight. The plastic does heat up the inside if there is any sun. It gets quite toasty necessitating opening the door.

The plastic I use is nothing fancy. It’s clear – actually cloudy white – from the hardware store. This is not greenhouse grade, but it works for the winter.

Winter Garden Greens

Generally this will hold plants into January, occasionally into spring. The shade house need only covering attention and door opening to raise some good Chinese celery and greens.

The raised beds need a more permanent winter garden solution. I’m hoping to get cold frames over both, but will make do over this cold spell.

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New Garden Beginning

My garden isn’t moving. My new garden beginning is the start of next year’s garden. It isn’t next year yet, but my garden begins when I plant my garlic patch.

Garden Preparations

Lots of things are on the ‘To Do’ list for next year’s garden. On top is clearing out the remains of this year’s garden.

Once killing frost arrives, the cucurbits, tomatoes and peppers are gone, what is left of them. The groundhog continues to evade capture thanks to squirrels removing the bait from the traps.

New cardboard and mulch are next on the list. Weeding is not the way I like to start next year’s garden. My method doesn’t eliminate the weeds, but does get about 90% of them.

Both raised beds need frameworks for plastic put up. The lumber is waiting. The workshop is being renovated.

old garden resists new garden beginning
Sugar pie pumpkins are supposed to be smaller vines, like butternut squash. These seeds didn’t know that and promptly started taking over part of the garden including racing across the garlic patch to climb up the fence. The pumpkin vines will be gone with killing frost, but the pumpkins will be in the pantry.

Fall Planting

There are greens planted for fall harvest. I don’t count these in my new farden beginning projects as they are a continuation from this year.

The Chinese celery looks great. That’s because the groundhog doesn’t like it. The other greens get eaten the day before I want to pick them. That’s another reason to put frameworks up over the raised beds.

garlic is the new garden beginning
As my garden is surrounded by lawn and pasture, weed seeds move in by the handfuls. The mulch helps keep the weeds at bay while keeping roots cool in summer and warm in winter. The trench in the mulch has garlic cloves planted in it. Once the garlic leaves are up, the mulch will be pushed around them.

Planting Garlic

This year the sugar pie pumpkin vines overran the garlic bed. As summer wanes, the vines are dying back.

There are four varieties of garlic this year: Hard neck (name unknown), German, Romanian and soft neck (probably California white). The patch wasn’t big enough so a row of walking onions left.

Rain has been scarce for a few months. It comes in quarter and half inch showers. The patch was a bit dry even under the mulch. Rain barrels supplied water.

The cloves are planted between piles of mulch. In a few weeks garlic leaves should tower over the mulch.

That will be my new garden beginning to grow, promising a first crop for the new year.

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Ending Summer Gardening

Fall’s arrival means ending summer gardening for me. It’s bittersweet for me, especially this year.

Many Challenges

Every year brings new gardening challenges. This year brought more than enough. It started with the spring crop of weeds as I didn’t get the cardboard and mulch down over the entire garden. The pathways were ankle deep by planting time.

Many of my crops didn’t come up. There is a black walnut shedding too many leaves, twigs and nuts over almost half of the garden. A wide variety of plants refuse to grow in such contaminated soil.

A new family of groundhogs moved in. So far I’ve eliminated four. The first one leveled the greens which did eventually grow back. The last one wiped out the okra, tomatoes, peppers, sunflowers and lima beans. Number five is working on the leftovers. Other leftovers were collected by a wood rat aka pack rat.

What damage the chipmunks and turtles did was masked by the groundhogs. Turtles do little damage and are easy to remove. Chipmunks are cute, for now.

Yuxi squash ending summer gardening
This squash is edible young as a summer squash or it will shell into a nice winter squash. I get the seeds from Baker’s Creek. I prefer it as summer squash mostly because if is an awkward shape. the goats love it young or shelled.

Bright Spots

Cucurbits ignore black walnut. Groundhogs and pack rats ignore squash, monster squash and pumpkins. Leeks, onions and garlic don’t seem to be on their preferred list either.

This is the first year in a long time I’ve grown onions. It won’t be the last.

We will also feast on butternut squash all winter.

The goats will enjoy monster squash for months. These mysterious squash seem to be a cushaw/Tahitian melon cross. Some crossed with the yuxi, I think, judging by the shape. The one trait all of them share is size. They are big.

monster squash for my cucurbit year
These are small monster squash. One that fell off the vine mostly shelled is about ten pounds. There are a couple of others similar in size or bigger.

Ending Summer Gardening

The squash bugs have finally overwhelmed many of the cucurbits. The winter varieties are shelling even as the vines die back.

The tomato vines still look lush on top, but fall blight is creeping up. There are few tomatoes as they got carted off or eaten by groundhogs and wood rat. The flowers have no time to develop before killing frost.

Only one container of peppers and one plant still have peppers on them. The okra leaves were eaten along with the flower buds.

With the arrival of October, I will be officially ending summer gardening as I start clearing out the summer crops, laying down cardboard and mulching. Instead I will concentrate on the few winter crops growing in the raised beds.

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Summer Squash Time

Gardening is rewarding, sometimes too rewarding. Summer squash is one of the prolific rewards.

There are many varieties to choose from. My preference is Zephyr.

Planning for Summer Squash

One garden bed is designated for planting these big, demanding plants. I dig down at least a spade’s length and dump in a pile of manure. The soil is put back on top to form the hill. Three fit in one bed.

Mulch hay is packed around the hills six inches or more deep. This will keep moisture in the soil and keep it cooler as the Ozark summer sun is hot. It does provide a place for squash bugs to hide.

Zephyr summer squash
Zephyr summer squash has distinctive coloring. The squash seems to stay tender to a bigger size than many summer squash types.

Planting

Summer squash is very frost sensitive. It is also fast growing. I stick three seeds in each hill.

The advice is to pull two of the three sprouts. I ignore this. I know squash bugs and borers will move in and can decimate a plant overnight. Leaving all three in each hill is insurance some will survive.

Growing

The fun part of growing my plants is watching them get started. They put out their first leaves. Their little roots are reaching down through the hill.

Those roots find the compost. Overnight the plants double in size and keep growing. The leaves are bigger than dinner plates. Flowers open.

squash bug eggs
A main enemy of summer squash is the squash bug. This is a cluster of squash bug eggs. The eggs are often on the under side of leaves, but can be on stems or on top of leaves. They should be destroyed.

Bug Wars

My big plants make the bug wars easier. I can get down on the ground and look up to see under most of the leaves. Squash bug eggs are collected and dumped into the tadpole rain barrels to drown. Bugs are squashed.

A watering can is another weapon. These bugs panic when they get wet. I water the much and stems so I can dispose of the fleeing bugs. I know I will eventually lose, but this delays the inevitable.

squash bugs
The newly hatched nymphs are green and barely an eighth of an inch long. They soon turn gray and grow quickly to this one close to adult size. The adult has the triangle on the back and overlapping wings of a true bug. The predatory wheel bugs look similar, but are good to have around. Squash bugs can destroy a squash plant overnight.

Harvesting

Summer squash must be checked and cut every day. Everyone’s plants produce about the same time. There is a glut of summer squash.

There are lots of recipes using squash available. I don’t do much cooking in the summertime and rarely do any desserts.

What do I do with this bounty? I sell some. We eat some. The goats eat some. I cook up some and puree it, freeze the puree and have great soup stock for next winter.

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Thirsty Plants

Summer has arrived in the Ozarks. Along with summer have come tiny rains and hot temperatures. That adds up to thirsty plants.

Wild plants along the roads stand with drooping, wilting leaves. There isn’t much help for them. That is the terrible thing about even a small drought: watching day by day as everything dries up and turns brown.

In the Garden

Some gardeners let their gardens dry up. Their plants must survive just like the wild ones as the gardeners pray for rain that may, if the garden is under the right cloud, fall in time.

I prefer to water and mulch. My garden represents a lot of planning and work. The plants are finally starting to produce vegetables for the table.

Getting Water

The only water sources near my garden are a dug well with a hand pump, the rain barrels and the creek. There is no faucet and hose. Instead, there are two watering cans.

Thirsty plants need plenty of water. Each of 60 tomato plants requires a full can. The pepper plants are smaller and take a little less. The squash plants need full cans and more. It adds up to about 80 cans of water and hours of time.

A better solution is pumping water up from the creek. This is an adventure.

eggplant experiment
Eggplant is a plant I rarely grow as my garden seems to be flea beetle central. These two plants have been under mosquito netting until they began blooming. Maybe they are big and healthy enough to survive now.

Creek Water and Fire Hose

A few years ago, the old water hose wore out. The replacement hose is a discharge hose, better described as a small fire hose. It is designed to move as much water as possible in the least amount of time.

There is no way to water my thirsty plants this way without getting wet, very wet. That is not a problem in the hot weather

The biggest problem is reducing the water flow enough to not uproot the plants while trying to water them. Mulch helps.

butternut squash vines are thirsty plants
My garden never has enough room in it. This year the butternut squash are growing up over the shade house. It does save space and shades the interior, but the vines can’t put down extra roots. If any of the squash get too big, they need supporting. And the vines try their best to escape and spread all over. There are three plants on each side. All take a gallon of water a day once they are twice this size. At least the squash bug eggs are easy to spot on the leaves and vines up on the cattle panel.

Waiting For Rain

Twice a week now I argue with the hose. My thirsty plants look good. I’m picking squash and watching tomatoes hoping they will turn red sometime soon.

My garden survives because I can water it. My pastures were ready to cut for hay. The balers haven’t gotten here. In another week, there will be no hay, only straw.

The clouds drift by. Maybe my pastures will be under the right cloud soon.

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Crazy Weather

Gardening is getting to be a big challenge. This isn’t due to age or time constraints. It has to do with crazy weather.

Midwest weather is changeable. Every season argues with the next one resisting its ouster. But this crazy weather has gone beyond that.

Rain and Drought

Floods came in May. A six-inch rain fell overnight or over a day and the creek rose. The next day the waters settled lower.

Now floods come any month of the year. They don’t take a six-inch rain as even a couple of inches pouring down in an hour or two brings the creek up.

These sudden floods tear out the creek banks. They undermine big trees. Most of the water runs off down to the river.

These rainy times give way to dry weeks to months. Often the dry spells take plants to the edge of survival before another rainy time moves in. This too will be followed by a dry time.

The Ozarks traditionally does have hot, dry summers. However, the new wet dry cycles may or may not fall into the old patterns.

Cold, Wet Springs

I love growing potatoes. It’s not that I can’t buy potatoes in the market or that I prefer some exotic variety. It’s that I love growing potatoes.

Spuds do like cool weather, but not cold weather. They need to get planted in March to beat the summer heat.

Now cold March weather keep them from growing. Frosts keep nipping any brave sprouts off. By the time the plants can finally grow, it’s late April and summer hits.

I no longer grow potatoes.

crazy weather allows snow peas and lettuce time to grow
Cool weather crops like snow peas and lettuce are lucky to survive long in an Ozark spring. This year the temperatures flirted with 80, but are staying in the 70s. Those flowers say I may actually harvest some snow peas this year.

Summer Crops

Every plant takes a certain amount of time to grow and bear fruit or reach harvesting size. That’s why gardeners in northern states grow different crops and varieties than those in southern states.

Tomatoes take sixty to ninety days. Peppers are much the same. Okra takes seventy-five days.

Killing fall frost arrives around October first. When summer crops can’t be planted due to cold and frost until late May, that puts summer harvest into late August.

As one who loves to garden, I’m trying to adjust to the new crazy weather patterns.

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Farmers Market Preparations

Gardening is a great hobby for lots of reasons like exercise and good food. Lots of good food. More than we can eat. That’s where farmers market preparations come in.

Many people don’t garden for one reason or another. Some neighborhoods won’t allow food gardening. Many people live in apartments and haven’t heard of container gardening. Others have small children who destroy seedlings.

These people are potential customers for fresh vegetables.

What’s Growing?

Farmers market preparations begin with seed selections. Some vegetables sell much better and for better prices than others.

I like spinach so I grow spinach. It wouldn’t sell well at the market. The same goes for turnips, beets, kohlrabi, Jerusalem artichokes and others.

Tomatoes are a big hit with customers. They are a favorite with market gardeners too. So the supply outruns the demand for much of the summer.

farmers market preparations include growing vegetables like these snow peas
Peas don’t stand much of a chance in the Ozarks. The taller varieties barely get grown before temperatures are in the eighties, too hot for peas. This year I’m trying a short variety of snow pea, only two feet tall and hoping it will win the race so I can enjoy some peas before the heat arrives.

Rule of Thumb

If you won’t eat it, don’t grow it. Some, maybe a lot of the produce taken to market goes home again.

That leaves the grower trying to use it up in some fashion. I freeze a lot of produce, especially peppers and tomatoes, to use over the winter. This last winter I enjoyed pureed summer squash as soup stock.

Competition

The worst competition comes from people who give produce away to their neighbors. It’s not a bad thing as the produce is used, usually.

However, it does mean fewer people coming to the market buying the produce being offered. Since the seller pays for their booth and spends time and labor to produce their crops, this hurts. Some of these sellers stop bothering to participate.

Getting Ready

My pepper and tomato seedlings are up. Onions are growing in my containers. Snow peas are several inches tall and trying to beat the race to summer temperatures.

This year I will attend a vendor’s meeting for the first time. I’m hoping to be a more serious seller this year.

However, my farmers market preparations are like my garden, subject to time and weather considerations.

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Reading Gardening Books

The weather is so inviting, warm and moist, perfect for gardening. It’s still February. So I’ve gotten out and am reading gardening books.

Some I own and keep on my book shelves like “Grow Your Own Chinese Vegetables”, “Secrets of Companion Planting for Successful Gardening” and The Ruth Stout No-Work Garden Book. These are now mostly for reference and refreshing the memory.

Others are from the library. Each spring these come off their shelves and get displayed on a table to tempt gardeners like me.

reading gardening books gives container ideas
Peppers tend to cross with each other. The most infamous are hot and sweet peppers so the fruits are cooler or hotter than expected. In my case, I have several varieties I like to grow and save seed from, so I want to grow them separately. Containers let me do this. These are an early Macedonian sweet pepper with great flavor.

Gardening Books Considerations

Gardening in the Ozarks isn’t like gardening anywhere else. Many of the books available come from other places, Vermont, Illinois, Michigan. Others are about fancy gardens I have no time for.

When I read one of these books, I have to evaluate the advice from the perspective of the Ozarks. The effects of climate change are playing havoc with gardening schedules as well.

Why Read Them?

Take the book I’m reading now “The Vegetable Gardener’s Container Bible”. It’s written for northern gardeners with short, cool growing seasons. The Ozarks has a longer, much hotter season.

What I take away from this book are ideas and advice about using containers in the garden. I’ve got several and I’m still learning how to get the most from them. Reading about them lets me find out some answers without making the mistakes.

Container gardening with tomatoes
Containers keep plants separate, allow targeted fertilizing, keep weeds at bay except for grass growing around the container, and let me put plants wherever I want. Keeping tomato vines in check is challenging.

Why Use Containers?

Originally, I used containers for special peppers I wanted to keep away from the bell peppers I grew in the garden. There are four pair set up around the house and yard.

These are cattle lick tubs and will hold one tomato plant of four pepper plants easily.

Now I have three tubs in the garden along with two raised beds which are permanent containers and a long metal trough. Other than growing peppers and spinach in these, I don’t know much.

Last year I had leeks in one. They did well. What about this year? That’s why I’m reading some gardening books. Suggestions so far are for lettuce, carrots, bok choi and bush squash. The first three have possibilities. The last would be a mistake here in my garden.

And so the season begins.