October 24, 2015 - Herb Box

Now that I've been through the first growing season with the new raised beds, time to reassess the 'herb' box, Box 4. The idea was to maintain this bed for perennial herbs as opposed to either growing them with seasonal vegetables whose beds have to be periodically refreshed and refilled with soil and nutrients or growing them only in containers where they have less room and opportunity to fully grow and thrive. I wanted to experiment with various herbs to see how they grew and progressed and to evaluate how much I would use each one in the kitchen.
Over the year the box held parsley, sage, chives, oregano (Greek and Italian), marjoram, Mexican oregano, and thyme. In addition I added a couple of basil plants to guarantee that I would have some in case the seedings in Box 5 didn't germinate and grow.
I also had a plan to seed both cilantro and dill in successive seedings to always have some available. That worked for a couple of plantings but then the third seeding never took. Another victim to overcrowding I'm guessing.

I've found myself using the thyme, marjoram, chives, parsley, sage, basil, and dill the most. Here are the plants as of this morning:

This thyme in the corner did very well all year until the past couple of weeks when it suddenly started losing entire branches. I haven't figured out the cause but it may be from overcrowding, age, watering (too much or too little). If a severe pruning doesn't ameliorate the situation I may just replant this winter.

The marjoram started out ok but then started dying back until I added some hand-watering this summer. It has since rebounded but has been crowded out by the neighboring basil and Mexican oregano 'trees' that have taken over the middle of the box.

The second thyme plant that has survived but never had the room or light to thrive. It also has died back suddenly at the same time as the other one.

The chives did very well but has overgrown somewhat over the past month. It was suddenly besieged by some tiny critters causing the plant to wilt significantly. I severely cut it back this week and sprayed it with oil to see if it can be salvaged. Another plant that may have to be replaced this winter.

The Mexican oregano took over the middle of the bed and has grown into a small tree. It has thrived but since I haven't used it at all I'll replace with one in a container to have around when I resume my Mexican culinary adventures.

Both basil plants, especially the outside one, exploded this summer after a slow start in the cold Spring. Like the M Oregano, it's become something of a tree. With the healthy plants from seeding in Box 5 and the fact that the flowering has taken it over, I may just remove this before it gets hit by the winter weather.

The Italian oregano was moved from the container it grew in over 2014. It survived but never really thrived probably due to overcrowding. It had some trouble in the early part of the year until I started hand-watering it.

This is the Greek oregano I had kept in the wine barrel container for several years until moving it into this box in January. Like the Italian oregano, it has survived but needed to be rescued with hand-watering at the start of summer. It too may have been hampered by overcrowding of the basil and M oregano.

The sage has done remarkably well. Once I remove the basil tree neighbor I'll trim it and see how it does over the winter.

The two parsleys I planted last winter did extremely well but died back in April. I added these to have some for the kitchen but they haven't thrived nearly as well. These also had to be rescued with hand-watering this summer.

The takeaway for me is to re-evaluate what herbs I've relied on in the kitchen and to replant the box accordingly. Since nothing here is irreplaceable I may have to completely replant with perhaps saving a couple of them while I do. I also will be concerned about overcrowding which I seem to have been guilty over the year.

Since all of these can easily be replaced, I may schedule to replant each winter and see how that goes. This will keep the soil healthier, guarantee the nutrients, and give me a chance to reconsider what to grow each year.

October 22, 2015 - Onion Planting

Best time I've heard to plant onion transplants in these parts is about December but since GrowOrganic sent these this week, I figured I better get these in the ground now as they won't last more than several days otherwise.
I planted two rows each of two varieties: Red Burger and Walla Walla, left to right. I prepared the rows each with blood meal and bone meal. I trimmed each onion to several inches on top and about 1/2" on the roots. I set the transplants to just where the bulb was as they tend to grow with the bulb just at the soil surface. It's easy to plant too deeply so I'm pretty careful about this. The plants are about 3"-4" apart in rows 12" wide.
I watered them thoroughly after planting and will keep them hand-watered until the garlic shoots in the west end of the bed have pretty much come up at which time I'll start the drip going. My idea is to allow the drip to be a backup to general rain and hand-watering during dry spells this winter. Supposedly El Niño is going to bring significant precipitation but after the past few years I'm not too encouraged yet.

October 17, 2015 - Garlic Planting

Last year's garlic harvest was less than usual as I wasn't able to get them into the ground until the boxes were built and filled with soil. This year I'm planting at the optimal time for the Bay Area, mid-October.
Spanish Roja, Italian Purple, and California Early White occupy the first 3 rows from the left, the fourth row is a mix of the Spanish and Italian. Yesterday I turned over the soil in Box 3 (home of this past summer's tomatoes) adding steer manure and replenishing the Local Hero then watering deeply. Today I've planted four rows, 12" apart, of cloves staggered within the row diagonally about 3" apart. Before planting I dug in both blood meal (nitrogen) and bone meal (phospherus) then planted the cloves top end 1-1.5" deep. No watering today and will not start doing so until the shoots emerge. The remainder of the bed will be dedicated to the onion transplants I'm expecting to be delivered this coming week.

October 11, 2015

Now that I've been through 10 months of growing season with the new raised beds and backyard configuration, I've had enough experience to help drive my approach in the coming years.

Herbs: The 'herb' box I established in Box 4 showed me which herbs I'm likely to use more than others. I'm going to reformat the box to hold the herbs I use on a regular basis - parsley, thyme, marjoram, oregano, sage - and relegate the others to pots. For instance, the Mexican oregano has become something of a shrub and I rarely find a use for it, at least so far this year. The basil has performed magnificently but the oregano is still having trouble filling out. The first planting of parsley was fantastic but subsequent ones have been weak as was the case with both cilantro and dill. The sage has done very well, it's filled out well without overgrowing its spot.

Greens: I still tend to over-plant in some cases especially in terms of greens. This isn't so bad if I am constantly thinning out the greens and using them while I do but if I don't so for just a couple of weeks, things can quickly get out of hand.

Garlic: I planted these late although the plants did pretty well. However the yield was somewhat disappointing. The bulbs took a long time to develop and not all of them did in the end. And what I've harvested has already started to rot quickly. I think this was a combination of the late start and the lack of rain in the earlier part of the plants growth.

Tomatoes: Next year when I plant tomatoes, I'm going to use my old method of establishing wells for the new plants, water them by hand for a few weeks to get them going, then work in the drip irrigation to eventually replace the hand watering with an eye on the progress of the plants as I do so. This past year I basically just relied on an arbitrary schedule for the drip to see how that would go and the results were less than stellar. Of course the unseasonably cold and overcast conditions of the Spring didn't help in getting the plants established either but there's not much to be done with that. What a weird year of weather we've had.

Peas: These also had a slow start and also something kept eating the seedlings as they would pop up so I had to replace them a couple of times. But the yield was good. The plants would quickly get mildew though. Another one to keep an eye on as the harvest can overwhelm a bit.

Beans: I scheduled bean planting to grow 4 different varieties in 4 different seedings with each seeding having one group of each variety. I also relied on the drip without any hand watering and, like the tomatoes, the first seeding had difficulty in getting started. Once they did, some varieties out-performed others and shoved them out by competition. Also it's good to remember that the beans will practically show up out of nowhere and, in the case of Romanos especially, will quickly over-mature to the extent that they are no longer edible. They're fantastic if you pick them at the right time but that time passes very quickly. And as you really need to look through the plants to find the beans, they can easily be overlooked. And the beans will go for longer than I'd expected so I'll anticipate that next year.

Carrots, celery, chicory: All of these performed well but in my use of them in frequency and taste, I didn't find that growing them, given the effort and space, was warranted.

Peppers: These had a hell of a time getting started (Spring cold) but once the weather improved in June and with the constant warm evening temperatures since then, they've done very well and should continue to do so until (if we do) get cooler temperatures and (could it happen?) rain.

Basil: Amazing yield this year, especially considering the trouble I've had with it the past few years.

Zucchini/squash: The two plants had a problem with blossom-end rot. Apparently this could have been due to the watering as with the tomatoes. Next year I'm going to take the hand watering approach with it to establish the plants and then work in the drip over time.

Broccolini: These take up considerable space but the yield has been good both in the winter and now in the fall. As the photos will show though, with our short trip to Chicago this past week, the stalks have quickly bolted. Another plant that can easily get away from you. So even though we've had one good meal, I've trimmed as much as I've harvested. Still more to come though.

Box 1

The broccolini has been getting away from me as I haven't had the chance to harvest quickly enough. But there's more to come from them. The greens were overplanted again but I've been thinning them out so there's been plenty to get from them.

Box 2

I pulled the squash a while back as it seemed we got what we were going to get. The beans are still growing but more sporadically. I've stopped watering it to conserve but next year I'll have a better idea of what to expect and how to deal with them.

Box 3

I pulled the tomatoes out a couple of weeks ago (Sept 27-29) and am going to prepare this box for garlic in the next week. Hopefully the box will provide access to enough sun in the autumn sky for the plants to get established.

Box 4

I'm going to reconfigure the box once the rain(?) starts to meet the requirements I have for my cooking as I detailed above. Too much Mexican oregano and not enough parsley, oregano, dill, or cilantro here.

Box 5

Lettuce, fennel, peppers, carrots, basil.