Going Off Da Grid, Janice

Friday, July 24, 2009

Growing

Bitter Melons are great because they never get the powdery mildew issue even though it is a curcurbit family member. The fruit is usually eaten immature when it's bitter as the name suggests, but I've heard that some people eat after it's ripened, and that it's sweet.

Remember the Kumquat that was transplanted to make room for raised beds? It survived and is gung-ho about producing fruit. I really didn't expect this tree to offer any fruit next season because of the transplant shock, but the mighty lil tree is proving me wrong!

Sapote sapling grown from seed

Avocado sapling grown from a Reed Avocado seed

The new set of tomatoes underplanted with a quick-growing Komatsuna crop we use for pickling.

Finally growing 2 Zucchini plants, late in the season

Second set of Thai Catchai watermelon(top) and Japanese Cucumbers

Kale plants in middle with bushbeans on the side. Peppers in the back

Today's Harvest

Bitter Melon, Millionaire Eggplants, Petit Gris Muskmelon, Tomato, Asian Pears and figs.

A Happy Camper taking a fig(he actually does not like figs raw, but will eat them in muffins)

Evil Pepper Weevils

Pepper Weevil: Anthonomus eugenii Cano, decided my peppers are delectable and eat most of them. I've never had problems with Pepper Weevils until this year. Maybe my Farmer's Market Peppers had some in there and I unknowingly composted them?(photo is not my own)

First inspection, the plants I had grown from seed look very healthy. But if you look carefully, the new leaves and blossoms are full of tiny holes. I hunted them down and squished each bug. I opened up all the infested peppers and killed the larvae too. Hopefully that should do the trick. I keep chekcing every morning to see if there are any new weevils. So far after day 3 of extermination, I haven't seen any new ones....yet.

Fruits of Our Labor

Tomatoes finally coming in. We have a somewhat shady spot this year, that's probably why it took so long to ripen.

Figs are coming in season, Fig muffins here we come!

Black Beauty Eggplants

A finally ripe Petit Gris Melon. I hear it's very delicious. I haven't eaten it yet! I'll let you know if it's as good as I've read the reviews to be.

Kyohou Grapes almost ready for picking

Thursday, July 23, 2009

Breakfast

Homegrown Strawberries and figs in homemade yogurt(soy). It's very yummy!

Today's Harvest

Yummy Figs, Asian Pears, Rugen Alpine Strawberries, Cherry Tomatoes, Japanese Cucumbers, Strawberries, and Millionaire Eggplant.

Wednesday, July 22, 2009

Half Homegrown Dinner

Let's see, starting with the cucumber and going clockwise: we have homegrown cucumbers, tomato, homegrown cucumber Kimchee, grilled eggplant, some hijiki(type of seaweed) with homegrown carrots and greenbeans inside. The beef, rice, organic chicken and hijiki are not homegrown of course. I'm trying to eat locally as much as possible, but hijiki(by the way is very rich in minerals) is hard to grow here in dry Southern California.

Today's Harvest

Tuesday, July 21, 2009

Harvest Updates

Lame little broccoli head. Ours never turns out looking anything close to the market ones. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

One day's worth of harvest(the onions were technically harvested earlier to dry tho)

Carrots that finally look like carrots and not gnarly gnomes! Still small though.

Garden Updates

It's really hot now that we rolled into July. Temps are in the 100+ these few days, and the plants are struggling too. The first set of cucumbers are almost tired out. This evening I transplanted a few more cuke and thai Catchai watermelon plants for the next round. I picked a Petit Gris melon that looked more pale than the rest. The vine is ravaged by powdery mildew and lost most of it's vigor. The aroma was very nice, but the taste was bland. I had sown carrot seeds a few weeks ago, but most of them failed to sprout because of the heat.

Tomatoes that were transplanted a few weeks ago are doing so-so. Tiny sprouts of Komatsuna are growing around the tomatoes until they get overshadowed.

Bushbean seedlings and some kale in the middle

Zucchini seedlings. We thinned down to 2 plants already

"wild" Rugen Alpine Strawberry growing in half-shade.

Cilantro slowing down with the heat. I've read that as soon as the root temps read 75 degrees F, the plant starts flower buds to set seed.

Japanese Cucumber doing nicely except for the tunneling worms in the leaves invading

Petit Gris Melon

Thursday, July 9, 2009

Yummy Summer Harvests

Sunday, July 5, 2009

Garden Updates

After the Kabocha Pumpkins came out, we tilled in some clay into this sandy soil. This area was originally a pond, and soil had been bought to fill it in. Unfortunately, it was mostly composed of decomposed vegetation and sand, so when all the vegetation was eaten up by the plants, it was just sand. Sand is easy to dig, but it retains no moisture or nutrients for a long time. So we got a few buckets of the clay from the Hacienda Hts house to ammend the soil a bit. We had buried tons of vegetation in this area, so I dug it up from about 3~4' deep to mix it up on the surface a bit more. After that I finally planted the herb garden mixed with some gerbera daisies. These herbs were potbound since we moved from the HH house so I'm sure this new home will be welcome for their roots. I planted Sage, Thyme, Basil, Lavender & Stevia.

Sorry this is blurry, I took it when it was about to be dark, I'm surprised the color is so vibrant though. This is the carrot and onion bed. I've been staggering the plantings of the carrots at about 3 weeks.

Here are the peppers I grew from seed

Potatoes were harvested, and now the beans are popping up on the side of the kale...yes we're trying to grow kale in summer, nuts? perhaps.

thinned out baby carrots

Summer Ripenings

Millionaire Eggplants going gung ho, I think there's at least 6 fruits growing at once.

Blushing yet??? no... not really, but getting big

Kyohou grapes almost ready

Asian Pear almost ready too!

Powdery Mildew

Summer is perfect for cucumbers, but it's also perfect for powdery mildew in our climate. We have scorching day temps and very cool humid nights. The mildew loves that sort of combination. This leaf was attacked by the mildew, then I sprayed a Potassium Bicarbonate, Garlic juice, orange oil and biodegradable dish soap concoction on and it seemed to stop the mildew from spreading.

As a request from Kory, I am posting my anti-powdery mildew spray recipe:

1 gallon water

4 tsp Potassium Bicarbonate powder

1 TBS of biodegradable dish liquid

1 TBS of orange oil

4~5 cloves of garlic minced very fine or pureed.

Let the garlic mush it steep in a small amount of water for about 30 minutes then strain out the pulp, then mix the liquid into the rest of the mixture.

Mix all ingredients thoroughly then spray with a regular pump sprayer you can find at Home Depot type stores.

You can buy Potassium Bicarbonate powder online from "do it yourself" wine making shops. I found mind on e-bay.

Don't use any dish liquid that has Sodium Laurel Sulfates (as a matter of fact anything with the word Laurel or Sulfate in it, even if says it's biodegradable, it's toxic to plants.

Spray on the plants when it is cool, not hot, as it will scorch the plants. Also, try not to spray on new shoots as they can scorch too. Prevention seems to be better. My Japanese Cucumber was barely infected when I sprayed, and they are still doing very well. The first sign of Powdery Mildew, spray and it should keep for a good while.

Before & After

The pole beans were done, and they came out. I pulled them out and composted them, although some people will till them under, I didn't bother, since I'm lazy...hehe. I added some leaf mold and then planted some tomatoes and put in some bell pepper seeds. I also planted some Komatsuna, a summer brassica that is a fast crop before the tomatoes overshadow them.