September 2020

9/16/2020 - September is over half gone. A week of much needed rain took a working slice out of the month. It was a glorious week of rain in just the right way. It would rain and stop for a soak in period, then rain and soak all throughout the week. Supposedly at my house I only got a couple inches but I can see the difference in the lawn and plants. I'm hoping to get some major work done on the garden projects before winter sets in. Right now the weather is perfect for outside hard labor work. I have to pace myself and not bring on injury or the rush to finish projects won't get done. Yesterday was a major accomplishment day.

Three more ground supports were put in place. Two more are needed and this side of the water tower will be completed. Then major bracing will be needed to keep the structure stable. I am hoping to get this side complete this year so that I can start using it next spring.  Getting both sides done would be a great accomplishment but I'm concentrating on this side and would be very happy if that's all that was done this year.

I have been toying with the idea to put a roof over the water tanks and catch the rain water. I have calculated that over the growing season upward of 1,000 gallons of water could be harvested for use in the garden growing season. Well, maybe less due to moisture from snow that would not be caught. That would have to be next year.

Work continues on Bed 1 at the Urban Ranch. I'm also hoping that this bed will be completed before winter sets in. This has been a year of major garden construction. The virus pandemic gave me a lot of time to work on such things. My schedule went from full to clear almost over night. I've been taking advantage of that and using the time to make garden improvements. Overall, it's been a great garden year. 

In spite of the dry summer the gardens have produced an abundance of harvest. More than I could really use or give away. I'm hoping with the water tower in production that next year will be even better. It's nearing time for garden cleanup to begin.

Bed 1 at Urban Ranch is coming along. This side needs one more block and then the back side can be started. I really want this bed complete by the beginning of winter so I can use it next spring. It's a lot of work but the end result will last forever. There will not be a rebuild in the future for as long as I live when I'm done. I am working toward that day when I can't wrestle those heavy blocks around and the garden beds will be easier to use. That might not be for a couple more years. I'm hoping that things will settle down by then. 

This is the hard labor part of bed 1 completed. Now comes the brick facing. I'm using concrete brick patio blocks up on edge partially buried in the dirt and construction adhesive to help keep them tight against the concrete blocks. I've decided to use woodchips for the paths between the beds. I am hoping to get that done soon.

August

August is here and harvesting has begun. The onions are drying on the rack; the sweet corn is being processed; the cucumbers are becoming refrigerator pickles; and the tomatoes and bell peppers are on the verge of turning red. This is the month that all gardeners covet. All their diligent work and sweat is finally paying off. Preserving and storing the harvest is foremost in the minds of those that garden. This is what it's all about. Canning, freezing, drying are all procedures that allow the tasty summer goodness to be enjoyed in the cold freezing winter months. 

August is project month. The neighbor across the street from Terra Nova Gardens gifted me with a pile of treated 4X4s some 12 foot long. I decided to use them for a new water tower stand which will hold two IBC tanks. These are 250 gallon tanks. This is the basic frame to hold these tanks. I will be putting many more legs under the tanks to make sure that the platform will not buckle under that much weight. I may have as many as seven more legs under the tanks.

Here's the frame up on the ground supports with only the corner legs. There's a bit of tweaking the level for the platform. It has to be extremely level when water is involved. Water will seek it's own level so if the platform isn't perfectly level and very stable, it just won't be very effective. I'm hoping that all will work out and by next year I'll be using the platform for the next level of garden watering. I am working toward automation of the watering from the tanks. Filling of the tanks will begin March 1st. It will take the entire month of fill the tanks. I will have to take the tanks to a car wash and spray them out. The tanks had truck wash in them which is basically soap. I want stair steps up to the platform for maintenance on the tanks and the water pipes. The tanks will be filled from the top. There will be a solid floor platform between the tanks where the work area is. 

Here is one of the pilons for the leg support for the platform. Two cement blocks are buried in the ground with a concrete deck support on top for the leg to set on. I will have a total of 18 of these to put under the tanks. I have figured out that each leg will support 250 pounds which I think is extremely over engineered. I want this structure to last forever. 

Friends have been hearing about the basement salad garden that I've been cultivating over the last six months. It's a simple method and works really well. I'm hoping to expand the plants from just lettuce and radishes to many more varieties. One lettuce plant can be harvested many times. It takes 25 days to grow a lettuce plant to harvest and probably three or four salads can be harvested from the plant over the next three to four weeks. This picture is a 16 ounce plastic cup that I've burned drain holes into the bottom with a small project soldering iron. This will also be the cup that's filled with potting mix soil. Regular garden soil is too compactable to use for this type of growing. 

Another cup of the same size will be needed for watering. When watering, this cup will be used to hold a small amount of water. I usually put about 1/2 inch of water in the cup. Then the cup with the soil and plant will be slipped into the watering cup. The water in this cup will wick up through the soil and keep the plant watered. Watering must be done every day or the soil will dry out and the plant will wilt. The good news is if this happens as long as there's still life in the plant a good dose of water will bring the plant back to a healthy state. These plants are durable and will snap back if given a chance. In my experience, the lettuce plants take about 25 days from planting the seed to the first salad harvest.

This is the soil cup planted with one lettuce seed and the water cup with the small amount of water in it. The lettuce seeds are extremely small but I've found that one seed can be planted with a little patience. All that's needed is a very little soil over the top of the seed and just enough spray bottle water to moisten the top of the soil. The seed package says there's 250 seeds in the pack but I think there's way more than that. Even if that's true, 250 seeds times about four or five harvests would be over 1000 salads in this package. When I start harvesting the lettuce leaves of one planting, I plant the next group of cups. That way I have a continuous supply of lettuce.

The planted soil cup is set inside the water cup and now all that's needed is a few days of keeping the top soil moist and waiting for the lettuce seed to sprout up through the soil. Once that happens it's time for close proximity grow lights. One thing I've learned is that it works better to start with fresh soil each time and to clean the cups.

I suppose that should be a given but I have a tendency to learn the hard way. Short cuts hardly ever work out.

This is about four or five days after planting. This was the very first planting and as you can see there's more than one seed in each cup. I only plant one seed now and if it doesn't sprout like the upper left cup. I just plant another in the cup. Even if that plant is a little later is ok as once the lettuce gets to harvest stage, it's good to have a couple slower growth plants. These plants I transplanted into their own cups and they were just fine. There's really no room for more than one plant per cup.

This is about 14 days from planting the lettuce seeds and these plants are well on the way to harvest. They could be harvested at this point but I usually wait a few more days for a bigger harvest.

It's day 25. Time to start harvesting and planting the next wave. The leaves on the plant can be harvested down to just a couple small leaves. The plant will recover and look like this again in about 8 to 10 days. Each harvest will be the same only with a longer main plant stalk. When the stalk gets so long that it falls over, the next wave is ready to harvest so I just pull the plant; dump the soil to go to the garden bed; clean the cups; and start over again.

Radishes can be grown as well and could be grown the same as lettuce but I've found that radishes can be grown in a little less space. These radishes can be grown in 1 1/2 inch PVC pipes that are about 4 inches long. Watering in this case is accomplished by putting about 1/2 inch of water in the tray and letting it wick up through the soil. Watering for radishes really only needs to be done on a demand basis. That is when the tray is dry for about one day then put another 1/2 inch of water in the tray. It only takes about 20 days to grow an edible radish. 

Twenty days after planting, a radish is ready for harvest. The top foliage can also be eaten. It tastes just like a radish. I suppose if icicle white radishes were your taste they could be grown in a deeper section of PVC pipe.  Many possibilities are available with this system. 

Of course grow lights are a must to get good plants. When the seeds are planted a grow light isn't necessary. The soil needs to stay moist on the top for a few days so a spray bottle is used to spray just enough water on the soil to keep it moist. Once the seed sprouts and starts growing, spraying the soil can be discontinued. When the seedlings are young, they need to be close to the grow lights to make sturdy plants. One to two inches away from the soil is a good place to start. As the plants grow (and they grow quickly) the space between the very top of the plant and the grow light needs to be kept as close to 2 inches as possible. Instead of constantly raising and lowering the grow lights, I raise and lower the tray of plants with spacers under the tray. The ambient temperature for this system is consistently 75 to 80 degrees.

July 2020

July 6

Not much gardening will happen today. It's all about mowing grass. When the day is over I'll be whupped. I'm hoping to get the front yard mowed as well. That will be three yards today. Granted Bradley will be mowing two of them but still it seems to drain my energy just emptying the bag for the lawn mower. 

 I did get all the backyard garden plants watered last night. I really should spend more evenings working on the Urban Ranch outside maintenance. I need to do some weed cleanup. 

 The corn looks good but there is a family of raccoons in the neighborhood that people seem to not just tolerate but love. They do love sweet corn and I expect that they will think it was grown just for them. I have harvested three zucchinis with more on the way without the vine borer making an appearance. Maybe planting it near the onions has made a difference. 

The cucumbers are looking good with tiny little cukes on the vines. I haven't been to Terra Nova Gardens for about a week so I don't know how the cucumbers are doing there. I have the squash seeds that need to be planted and will try to do that before Sherry gets here.

Round two for bell peppers and tomatoes have been planted in bed two at the Urban Ranch. I do need to mulch them in to keep the moisture level in the soil at a even level. 

The bucket tomatoes look like last year with the curling leaves which MiGardener says its not a bad thing. It just looks to me like an unhealthy thing. It's from hot weather. The plant tries to conserve water in the leaves by curling. The tomatoes and blossoms do still look good but I'm just not used to have a plant that looks to be stressed out.

July 24

This is the corn harvest for the day and the accumulative harvest of zucchini. I think the zucchini is finally done with setting fruits. I've never had a harvest like this before the vine borers take it down. They weren't a problem this year so I've really gotten a haul. I give the glory to the onions that were planted near by and were over taken by the zucchini plants. I'm hoping that I have discovered a natural way to circumvent the dreaded vine borer of Nebraska. It would be an amazing discovery. 

This is just two zucchini plants that have overgrown the front of the bed and over shadowed half of the onion bed behind them. Actually there's four plants there. When I planted them I put two seeds in each spot and all four grew into plants. It doesn't seem to bother the plants to be crowded together. In fact it seems that they kind of like it. I'm going to try it again next year to see if it was just a fluke or if I actually have discovered some thing..

Here you can see how the zucchini bullied the onions but they still survived. Onions are a hardy plant. I will say the onions under the shadow of the zucchini are smaller but still of usable size. It's a fair trade off to keep the vine borers at bay. 

The onions and zucchini seem to coexist well together. It's difficult to believe that onions have actually matured. It's the first time I have actually grown onions from seed to maturity. 

The onion harvest is in. Not bad by any means. I can still remember that frosty day last February when the tiny little seeds were carefully put in the trays to begin there journey to maturity. I can remember the day when the first little sprouts popped up out of the dirt and started to grow. Then the grooming of the little plants by snipping a tiny bit off the top to keep the onion stalk strong and straight was a weekly task. Finally in May the day came when the tiny little sprouts were set out in the world and left to fend for themselves in the warm days, cold nights, and rain storms. They grew straight and strong until the longest day of the year came (June 21st). Then it was time to put all their strength into fattening up the bulb. As the days passed the bulbs grew and grew into nice plump onions. Having done their very best at maturing the once strong and straight stalks began to bend and break which is a sure sign that they're done growing and it's harvest time. A lot has happened in the world from the time the tiny little onion seed became the mature onion plant. It's nice to know that in the middle of a chaotic world that nature is still doing what it's supposed to do. The rabbits are still trying to eat my plants, the raccoons are still attempting to steal my sweet corn, and weeds have launched another assault to take over the garden.

The joy of growing a garden is being able to give away some of the produce to neighbors, friends, and family. The neighbor just came over and took home a zucchini, YEA, some corn and onions. It trills me to see that happen. The onions are now drying out on the picnic table in the back yard. I'm hoping not to have any rain for a few days. One thing I learned this year is that onions don't start growing their bulb until after the longest day of the year. The time before that is when the plant is growing and getting the strength to form the bulb

July 25

Here's the harvest for today. It's 20 ears of sweet corn from Terra Nova Gardens. I've already eaten about 1/2 a dozen and given away about 8 or 10 ears to Neighbor Tim. I will process these by blanching and freezing the ears in Ziploc bags. I think there's about that many left to harvest by the time the second wave is done. Maybe it was a good thing that I didn't have another full bed of sweet corn. The corn has not been molested by the raccoons again this year. The electric fence does a good job. Now that I have a solar panel the battery was super charged up when I tested it today. I still have about another month of corn protection until all the corn is harvested. 

Corn in the kettle boiling hot

Five minutes cooking and then it's not.

Icy cold is what it's got

Destined for frozen is it's lot.

Yes, I am terrible at poetry. It was not even remotely some thing I liked in school but I've drawn to dabble with terrible rhymes for many years. So anyway there's 20 ears with more on the way. I have enough to nibble on in the back yard and still I have maybe another 20 at least at Terra Nova Gardens. That's 20 meals of corn with two ears each meal. 

July 30

Another summer harvest. I'm thinking the zucchini is done and the plants need to come out. It will free up the bed for perhaps a fall crop of some thing that's quick to grow. If I don't doddle too long I could plant some green beans. There's always salad greens but I have those in the basement area. It's some thing that I've not done. Fall gardening is different than Spring gardening. 

Cucumbers are producing their meager harvest so my thought is to make some refrigerator pickles. I've not done that before but they look easy enough. It gives a pickle that has more crunch which I like. The canned pickles just don't have the crunch that store pickles have. I like the crunch.

This batch of corn was just bagged and frozen. My research says that the unblenched corn will be just fine for short storage. The long term storage is where the unblenched corn enzymes start causing the taste and texture to change.

This is the drying rack in the basement for the onions. It's just window screen stretched over the frame of the seed starting station. I run a fan on them for a time to help with the drying process. It worked really good and soon I will braid the onions and hang them up for storage. I hope to continue this process again next year. 

June 2020

June 22, 2020
June has been an interesting month. We are not even close to the 5 inches of average rain fall. So far this month it's only been 2.11 inches. The plants are doing well even with the moisture drought. 

Other that basement watering of plants, there's been no garden activity today. 

The big project of the month has been the water tower platform. It's coming together nicely and should be functional by the end of the summer. I am hopeful to have it operational by next year. with a couple more beds in operation. I haven't decided just what to do with the next two beds. I don't have the two sweet corn beds fully planted just yet. I did get the cucumbers planted under the trellis and will plant the squash when I get the seeds from eBay. They are supposed to arrive July 2nd. That's about the right time to plant them to circumvent the vine borer. The zucchini plants are not affected just yet and I'm trying to keep an eye on them to see if eggs are being laid around the base of the stem. So far they look good and healthy.  I would like a glut of zucchini to give away to friends.  I wish I could have planted more but even with the pandemic, friends, family, and others have kept me busy. I have had more time but it's never enough.

May 2020

May 24, 2020
Well May is almost over. Just one more week left. I have really not gotten much done with all the extra time that's been given to me with the Coronavirus. I'm a little disappointed at how much my body has gone down hill and can't do as much as it used to do. I can still do what I used to do but for only a couple hours a day and then it takes the rest of the day to recover. I want to get some major improvements done to the Urban Ranch as well. I really thought after nine years at Terra Nova Gardens it would look a lot better than it does. I guess those heavy work years with great accomplishments are gone. It was what I thought would probably happen. I have to get some thing worked out that will move forward but at a much slower pace to deal with the aging body issue.

The living poor man's patio looks fairly decent this year. I built two pedestals to set flower plants on beside the driveway on the West side. It's a great display.  The project for the patio is the replacing of the chair wood. I have one Cedar board to begin the process. It looks fairly simple with just cutting the board to the right length and bolting them onto the frame. The frames are in good shape it's just the wood that needs attention.

This is the beginning of the bucket garden for this year. I now have the tomatoes in the gutter nearest the grass planted. The next gutter in the middle has four peppers planted. I have more peppers to plant and complete the pepper planting in the bucket garden. I have enough peppers to put some out at Terra Nova Gardens. The first gutter is now on automatic bottom gutter watering with the float valve in place and adjusted. I discovered last year that until the roots make their way down to the net cup and out into the gutter, top watering needs to happen. I will use the suckers from the tomatoes to start more tomato plants this year. Supposedly it will work quite well. I'll give it a try and see if it works for me. 

I have the moveable fence up around the sweet corn. The batteries are charged and the fencer was tested. All are in good condition still so it's ago to put up the electric wire around the steel fence and once again the sweet corn will be protected. I tried the circle growing method with corn again this year but I've decided that it's just too much work and won't visit that method again. It's just easier and quicker to plant in rows.  I still need to prepare the second bed for sweet corn. 

I've started cleaning up the front Rugosa Roses by the road. Much of the initial growth has died off for some reason. I'm hoping by cleaning it up and mulching the ground again it will regrow. It really looked great after about four or five years but the last couple years it's really struggled. I'm wondering if it's because of Tim's spraying for weeds along the road. I suspect the drift hits the bushes and doesn't kill them but really makes them sick.  

The Urban Ranch planted sprouted corn seeds are up and growing. Only one didn't come up. I'm going to sprout some more for Terra Nova Gardens.

May 26, 2020
Today is another rain day. It's been a rain week so far. It's good for gardens planted but not good for planting gardens. 

I have been working on restoring the patio furniture wood. It was given to me a few years ago by Teresa my cousin. It lasted some years but being outside all the time even in the Winter takes a toll on patio furniture. It's time to replace the wood in the complete set. The frame is still very solid and doesn't have much rust on it. 

What a difference this makes. It was a little tricky to do the back as not only was it curved on the ends but it was slanted 15 degrees. It's not as smoothly cut as the original but good enough for me. So now it's on to the next chair and then a bench and table top.

March 2020

March 6 - Here comes March like a lion. Yesterday the winds were strong. They were staining winds of 25 to 30 MPH and gusts up to 55 MPH. Today not so much. March is a volatile month with weather changing almost at a moment's notice.

This little crocus is trying its best to show us all the Spring is indeed here. I for one am ready for this year's garden to begin. I just might actually have a garden to enjoy this year. The last couple years have been challenging. For two years it's been a bust for gardening. I haven't really had a true garden since 2017 which was my best year. This year other than having the structure still in place, it will be like starting over. It will be a lot of work and time spent to bring up to a workable garden again. It may not all get done this year but I can hope for major accomplishments. One of the main time obstacles has been removed from my schedule so it will give me much needed time to spend at the garden. I have more plans in my head than can ever be accomplished in one life time but it's what keeps me exciting about living.

The lettuce and radish experiment was a great success. I am ready to harvest the third harvest from the lettuce and have a couple more good radishes on track to be harvested. It's a little more difficult to grow a good radish but the up side is that once it's known that the radish won't be turning out so good, it can be eaten as a microgreen so not all is lost even for a bad radish.

It's time to start sprouting some Bell Pepper seeds. Last year I sprouted the seeds and in 10 days I had plants growing. The seeds sprouted in five days and the planted sprouts were up and growing in another five days. I'm hoping for the same this year. It's a sure way of getting 100% planted germination. If the seeds are planted directly in the seed starting tray, it can take up to three weeks for them to germinate so if they don't germinate or are sporadic, then it's another three week wait to see if the next group will germinate. So the sprouting before the planting method worked great last year and this year will be the test to see if I still have the touch.

I hooked up the rain water hose to the tank a couple days ago. It's now set to collet water for the roof. February was a very dry month and it looks like March has started with dry weather. I think February had about .02 inch of moisture and so far there's been nothing in March. I'm just waiting for those Spring rains to kick in. 

Saturday March 7 

First day at Terra Nova Gardens. Not much happening there at the moment. I started building the east side of bed number 3 with the blocks that came from the flood area north of Fremont. I have a stack large enough to build one raised bed. This bed is in the formal area of the garden. It will most likely take me most of the summer to get it built. I do want the path done by the end of October. With the extra time in my schedule it just might happen on the road back to full production of Terra Nova Gardens. I have a high hope of really getting some things done this year. There's much to do and I have a head full of plans for both Terra Nova Gardens and Urban Ranch. 

This is the end of the first day's work.  The wall will continue for about 20 more feet. The top will be covered with a solid top block to finish out the side. I am hoping to be at least a section like this added to the bed every time I come to the garden. A little bit each day will get the job done soon enough. As I look around at Terra Nova Gardens I see need every where. The neglect for two years has really taken a toll on this garden. 2017 was an awesome year but now the garden just looks very sad and unhappy. I do hope nothing happens to circumvent the progress this year but one never knows what the future will bring.

It's raining today but so far it's been very little moisture. Not even enough to raise the rain water tank level. The website says .24 inches of rain which would be about 36 gallons of water.  The rain guage in the garden says no measurable moisture and the was in the big tank says no water saved.

This is the lettuce after two harvests and from the looks of it, definitely will be needing to harvest again today. The radishes are a little more finicky about growing. Maybe it just the way radishes are but not every one will turn out to be a good radish. After about a week of growth some will stand straight and stocky and some will be leggy and spindly. I've just pulled the leggy ones and thrown them in the salad for microgreens. I'd say only about a third of the radishes planted turn out to be good radishes. It takes about 20 days for a radish to grow to harvest size.

I have more kinds of radish to plant to see if one would be better than what I'm using. Right now the best I've found is Champion. The foliage stays small and the radish grow to a deceit size in about 20 days. I have some others that I want to try that are a bigger size but they might not be suited for indoor growing in PVC pipe.

February 2020

Here it is February already. An entire month has passed by. I'm happy with how the seed area is progressing. Now if the plants can just keep growing and produce a harvest, I will be ecstatic. It will mean that I can sustain a garden inside the basement basically year round. The possibilities are huge.

The lettuce plants are on day 7 from planting and the radishes are on day 5. In a couple more weeks on Valentine's Day, the onion seed will be planted. That will be the official start of the garden year.

02-02-2020

 


More of the same. The Radishes are a little spotty with germination. They have germinated but at way different times. Some germinated at three days and some are just now germinating at 6 days. Well, it was old seed.

02-05-2020



Four radishes have grown from 10 planted but it was from old seed so I will except that as an excuse. The lettuce and the radishes have really popped since I gave them a feed. I'll wait another week and give them a light feed again. It's been 11 days since planting. I'll wait another week or two to transplant the lettuce plants to one plant per cup I think I'll have about 10 plants.

02-14-2020



The radishes are starting to put on some weight and I'm thinking that this might be viable way to grow radishes year round. I'm interested to see how the bigger radishes will do as they approach harvest. The radish that I just planted can get up to 1 1/2 inches in diameter which is the diameter of the PVC pipe. If need be I could go to a bigger pipe.

The lettuce just keeps growing leeps and bounds just like the video said. I don't bathe them in the hydroponic nutrients but I do feed them once a week with miracle grow general fertilizer

02-16-2020

The outside tulips are up and growing. The tulip containers have no sign of growth. I'm not sure the bulbs made it through the winter. If they don't come up, next year I'll just keep the bulbs in the refrigerator and plant them about this time of the year in the containers.

In the ground tulips are up and growing.



Radishes are really putting on weight now and starting to look like a radish. Roots are out the bottom of the PVC pipes. The new radishes are reaching toward the light. I think I should have put them in a different tray closer to the light. They are looking a little spindly. If they don't do well, I'll start the next batch closer to the light.

Lettuce continues to grow and look ever so good. So the lettuce is 22 days from planting and the radishes are 20 days from planting. Ten more days and radishes should be ready for harvest. Twenty three days until lettuce should be ready for harvest.

02-19-2020

The second planting of radish turned out very leggy and had to be replanted.

The experiment with winter gardening has been a complete success so far. The next round will be expanded into a bigger planting. It might be a year round operation.

02-20-2020
Radishes are looking good with seven more days to go for a 30 day harvest. I think they could be harvested right now and maybe I'll have to harvest them early. It's time to think about what the next step will be in this experiment. I could ramp it up big time but I'm just not ready for that. Maybe a few more and gently ease into the routine of a steady crop of greens and radishes. It's better than microgreens for me. Actual salads are a good step toward winter growing.

02-22-2020

This is the radish harvest after 25 days. I probably should have harvested about three days earlier. So it would be around 21 days or three weeks. The lettuce could be harvested and I just might have a fresh garden salad today.  The lettuce is just under 30 days. This is a hugely successful experiment. Now I just have to figure out how to get a succession of harvest schedule.

The onions are coming along. I have replanted some of the empty pods and it looks like I'll be planting some more empty pods again. This method seems to be working wonderfully well.
I have snipped off the bent tops. I did that last year and this year I learned that is what needs to be done to keep the stems strong. It seems that every thing I figure out on my own gets confirmed that it's the right thing to do.

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