Tag Archives: avocados

A spring morning in my front yard on Harvest Monday April 8, 2013

Posted on April 9, 2013 | 8 Comments

When last I left you, I was headed up into the mountains, going to Big Bear to look at a “bargain” cabin being offered at $64,000. It was HORRID! The water heater had broken and there was water standing on the floor in the kitchen and bathroom. The carpet, if you could call it that, was filthy and matted with dog hair. Also lumpy, bumpy and crusty from what might have been urine. The walls were flimsy, cheap paneling. The electrical system didn’t work. The appliances looked original to the cabin, circa 1968. The paint on the exterior had peeled with raw wood exposed. The sliding patio door onto the balcony upstairs was broken and boarded up. The sliding door downstairs didn’t work. OMG, did that place ever have issues. It needed to be stripped to the studs, and then who knows what other problems might arise. That one was not for me.

This beat-up gambrel cabin is on the market for $64,000.

This beat-up 3-bedroom gambrel cabin is on the market in Big Bear, CA for $64,000.

I have focused more on home this week, now that my cold is dissipating. I am finally getting my energy back, and am enjoying my spring yard.

This is a post about a harvest. But a harvest from the garden can be more than mere pounds of produce. A garden also produces peace, tranquility and beauty. That is harder to measure, but I hope that you can see it in these photos.

Our front yard is mostly trees, shrubs, flowers, herbs, bird feeders, and a small pond.

Our front yard is mostly trees, shrubs, flowers, and herbs, with a few fruit trees, bird feeders, and a small pond. This is the view from a bench on our front porch.

Yesterday morning, I decided to sit on the porch bench and take photos only from where I was sitting. It was an interesting challenge. My Nikon Coolpix P510 is a great little camera, with 42x zoom. It allowed me to photograph birds and flowers from where I sat.

In addition to the pond, we have a bird bath. The one is back is a used fountain dropped off by our tree guy. Someone was throwing it out because it no longer holds water. I plan to fix it if I can.

In addition to the pond, we have a bird bath. The one in back is a used fountain dropped off by our tree guy. One of his customers was throwing it out because it no longer holds water. He thought I might be able to fix it. My first attempt failed. I will try Plan B some other day.

After having this dwarf Valencia orange for four years, I finally got around to planting it in its permanent pot. It is in full bloom. I'm sure it will do better now that it is finally our of its nursery pot.

I got up off the bench to take this photo. After having this dwarf Valencia orange tree in its original nursery pot for four years, I finally got around to transplanting it into its permanent pot. It is in full bloom. I’m sure it will do better now that it is finally out of its nursery pot.

The Valencia orange tree is loaded with blossoms and it smells so good.

The Valencia orange tree is loaded with blossoms and it smells so good.

The strange looking plastic box to the right of the Valencia tree is one of our four water barrels for collecting rainwater. Our part of Orange County, California gets only about 11-14 inches of rain a year, hardly more than a desert. Any little bit of water that I can collect and use is that much less water that needs to be pumped down from northern California, and then put through water filtration and purification. Saving water saves energy, and therefore helps fight global warming. That’s what we are all about here at Green World.

Pink cobbity daisies

Pink cobbity daisies

Louisiana iris blooming in the pond.

Louisiana iris blooming in the pond.

Light lavender Louisiana iris in pond.

Light lavender Louisiana iris in pond.

Male house finch at feeder.

Male house finch at feeder.

White-crowned sparrow

White-crowned sparrow

White-crowned sparrow

White-crowned sparrow

Pink cobbity daisies

Pink cobbity daisies

Female house sparrow

Female house sparrow

Pink English daisies.

Pink English daisies.

Ack! A slug! I didn't even notice it until I was processing the photos.

Ack! A slug! I didn’t even notice it until I was processing the photos.

Clivia or Kaffir lillies

Clivia or Kaffir lillies

Fressias by the pond with iris and curly rush in the background.

Fressias by the pond with iris and dwarf curly rush and dwarf straight rush in the background.

Freesia buds in the oregano bed.

Freesia buds in the oregano bed.

A bushtit after bathing in the pond. A pair has been collecting nesting material from our yard this week.

A bushtit after bathing in the pond. A pair has been collecting nesting material from our yard this week.

A male black-headed grosbeak stopped by on his migration north to fill up on sunflower seeds.

A male black-headed grosbeak stopped by on his migration north to fill up on sunflower seeds.

This is most of our front yard. The "lawn" is Zoysia or Korea Grass. Never needs mowing. No herbicides or pesticides go onto it either, so our yard is safe for birds, bees, grandchildren and other living things. The pavers help reduce the amount of water needed to keep the lawn growing.

This is most of our front yard. The “lawn” is Zoysia or Korea Grass. Never needs mowing. No herbicides or pesticides go onto it either, so our yard is safe for birds, bees, grandchildren and other living things. The pavers help reduce the amount of water needed to keep the lawn healthy.

Hope you enjoyed that little photo essay of a morning in my front yard. I think that there are 25 different species of plants in bloom in front right now, maybe more.

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I can’t believe that we harvested a bell pepper this week, but here is the proof. It set fruit during an unseasonable warm spell last October.

The bell pepper went into a scramble along with red onion, mushrooms, and an avocado (also from the garden). The navel orange is from our tree.

The bell pepper went into a scramble along with red onion, mushrooms, and an avocado (also from the garden). The navel orange is from our tree.

Here is our harvest for the week ending April 7, 2013.

FRUIT

3 lbs 6 oz Limes

VEGETABLES

3 oz Bell Pepper

12 oz Bok Choy

TOTAL PRODUCE 4 lbs 5 oz plus 28 eggs

I am slowly catching up on logging in my harvests to Excel. The total harvest so far this year is 32.3 lbs of fruit and 12.8 lbs of vegetables, plus 194 eggs.

If you had a harvest or to see what others are harvesting, visit Daphne’s Dandelions.

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Start of a new year

Posted on January 25, 2013 | 8 Comments
Our new neighbors to the south removed the HUGE cypress trees whose roots had cracked our sidewalk. This is our new sidewalk. New fence to come later.

Our new neighbors to the south removed the HUGE cypress trees whose roots had cracked our sidewalk. This is our new sidewalk. New fence to come later.

New year, same old bad habits. I’ve been too busy doing other things to post a blog entry.

The neighbor's huge cypress trees are gone and so is the sidewalk that the tree roots cracked. This is our new sidewalk on the south side of the house.

The sidewalk to our front door has lifted due to roots of our liquid amber (sweet gum) trees. We are having this repaired next week after the rain stops.

In addition to concrete work, we have had work done on the deck and both bathrooms inside the house. Also, my husband hired a cleaning crew that has been attempting to turn our pigsty of a home into something more suitable for humans. I would rather garden than clean, and it shows! The reason for this mad rush to get work done was my recent 70th birthday. We had a multi-day celebration with out of town guests. I may post photos later if I get around to it.

Peep and Cheep will be six months old next week. Their combs and wattles have turned red. Can eggs be far off?

Peep and Cheep will be six months old next week. Their combs and wattles have turned red. Can eggs be far off?

This is Cheep. She is slightly lighter than Peep.

This is Cheep. She is slightly lighter than Peep.

Miss Hillary, our two-year-old Barred Rock has gone into molt and quit laying. The next week, the Black Australorp named Henrietta, our oldest hen at age four (or is she five? I forget), began laying. I ran out of eggs that I had frozen last spring and actually had to BUY eggs even though we have five hens now. That seemed so wrong.

We decided to keep the olive tree. By "we" I mean my husband. So I had it trimmed this week. This is the before photo.

We decided to keep the olive tree. By “we” I mean my husband. So I had it trimmed this week. This is the before photo.

 

As part of my birthday celebration, I dressed up our front walkway with a new arrangement of succulents.

As part of my birthday celebration, I dressed up our front walkway with a new arrangement of succulents.

 

I added some new cymbidium orchids because the ones I have now are still a few weeks away from blooming and I wanted orchids in BLOOM for my birthday.

I added some new cymbidium orchids because the ones I have now are still a few weeks away from blooming and I wanted orchids in BLOOM for my birthday.

The deck work didn't get finished. It still needs sanding and staining. But I needed things put back on the deck prior to my party. I added some new plant stands to dress things up a bit.

The deck work didn’t get finished. It still needs sanding and staining. But I needed things put back on the deck prior to my party. I added some new plant stands to dress things up a bit.

I used my new cordless rotary saw, cordless drill and electric sander to build a little plant stand using scrap lumber from the new neighbor's home renovation project. The one on the right has little legs to keep my plants off the new deck so they won't rot it out. I still have to build the one on the left and then paint them both. Power tools are fun.

I used my new cordless rotary saw, cordless drill and electric sander to build a little plant stand using scrap lumber from the new neighbor’s home renovation project. The one on the right has little legs to keep my plants off the new deck so they won’t rot it out. I still have to build the one on the left and then paint them both. Power tools are fun.

The raised bed in front is looking good with broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, beets, and carrots nearing harvest readiness.

The raised bed in front is looking good with broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, beets, and carrots nearing harvest readiness.

These are the best looking heads of broccoli that I've had in years.

These are the best looking heads of broccoli that I’ve had in years.

I have a few bell peppers nearing harvest, but these are the last of the season, set during an unseasonable October heat wave.

I have a few bell peppers nearing harvest, but these are the last of the season, set during an unseasonable October heat wave.

I have a few avocados left from last year's fruit set. I need to harvest them so I can prune the tree before it is in full bloom.

I have a few avocados left from last year’s fruit set. I need to harvest them so I can prune the tree before it is in full bloom.

I have one small Granny Smith apple left on the tree that needs to go into a salad.

I have one small Granny Smith apple left on the tree that needs to go into a salad.

The navel orange tree set quite a crop last year, and the fruit is ripe for the taking. Ditto the Meyer lemon and lime trees.

The navel orange tree set quite a crop last year, and the fruit is ripe for the taking. Ditto the Meyer lemon and lime trees.

I need to squeeze and freeze juice from the lemons and limes so we will have it in summer when we want cold citrus drinks.

I need to squeeze and freeze juice from the lemons and limes so we will have it in summer when we want cold citrus drinks. These are limes.

I managed to get some onions planted. Not sure they will all survive, but at least a few look like they are going to make it.

I managed to get some onions planted. Not sure they will all survive, but at least a few look like they are going to make it.

I'm growing strawberries in planters in the driveway, since I am out of room in the yard. A few berries are coming along.

I’m growing strawberries in planters in the driveway, since I am out of room in the yard. A few berries are coming along.

Oh look, it's spring already. My paperwhite narcissus are nearing the end of their bloom, while these double narcissus are at peak. My daffodils are just now poking up out of the ground.

Oh look, it’s spring already. My paperwhite narcissus are nearing the end of their bloom, while these double narcissus are at peak. My daffodils are just now poking up out of the ground.

My raised beds in back have three tomatoes that I'm trying to overwinter. I picked the last tomato a few days ago. The onions are in the middle bed. The farthest bed has bell peppers

My raised beds in back have three tomatoes that I’m trying to overwinter. I picked the last tomato a few days ago. The onions are in the middle bed. The farthest bed has bell peppers

As usual, I’m behind in planting my winter garden. I have no peas in the ground yet. Well, there is only so much time in the day. Speaking of which, I have to run or I’ll be late for work. Yes, I’m 70 and still working. No wonder my garden gets neglected.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Harvest Monday May 21, 2012 and a peek at future harvests

Posted on May 22, 2012 | 12 Comments

I enjoy photographing things when they are still growing more than harvested produce, so as usual my photos are heavy on plants in the ground vs harvested ones in the trug. But I’ll lead off with some harvest shots.

My last red cabbage split, but it tasted wonderful fried up with an onion and some German sausages. Seems that the artichokes all got ripe at once, but they tasted great cut fresh from the plant and plopped into boiling water. Dipped the leaves and heart into lemon butter. Oh, my. Heavenly.

This is what a perfectly ripe avocado should look like. I like to squeeze lemon juice into the avocado, sprinkle on some sea salt, and eat it with a spoon. I’m down to the last 9 avocados on the tree, with only one new fruit set that I can find. It looks like I won’t have the wonderful abundance of avocados next year that I’ve enjoyed this year.

Our avocado has finished blooming. This tiny avocado is the only one that I can find. It won’t be ready to harvest until next January. I’m hoping that there are more avocados hidden among the leaves.

Oops, I nearly forgot to photograph my first harvest of bok choy from my new raised bed. I pull the outer leaves rather than the entire plant so that I can extend the harvest from my six plants.

I see that I neglected to photograph the peach harvest. I got over four pounds, but they are small, so nearly half of that is pit and skin. I spent a long time preparing the fruit for a peach dumpling recipe from a Smoky Mountain cookbook. Sadly, the recipe turned out awful!

There was obviously a mistake in the cookbook because it said the dough would be stiff. But it made a runny batter, not a thick dough. I added more flour, but the dumplings cooked up like paste. Or maybe glue. The fruit sauce was tasty, but I ended up feeding the dumplings to the hens. They loved them. What do they know?

Our Santa Rosa plums are nearing harvest size. They will turn deep purple before they’re ready to pick. We have a large tree, but only four plums on it.

Our Katy apricots are also nearing harvest. We have four of them. Not a great year for either plums or apricots in our yard.

Our very small August Pride peach tree set only three peaches this year, but it looks like they will be large ones. I didn’t photograph the Babcock Improved peaches, but that tree set quite a few peaches. They will be the last ones to be harvested.

The Snow Queen nectarine is still blooming, but so far about a dozen nectarines have set. The Panamint nectarines are nearing harvest, maybe 30 of them.

The fruit set on our Granny Smith dwarf apple has been pathetic so far. There are still a few more blooms, so maybe we’ll get more. The honey bees have been noticeably absent from our yard this spring. I was happy to see several of them today, so there is still time to get some apples fertilized.

The Granny Smith apple tree is almost done blooming, but the Gala and Fuji trees are just beginning. It was a warm winter here, so there may not have been enough hours of chill for the Gala to set fruit. It requires a few more hours chilling than the Fuji or Granny Smith. Sadly, neither of my Asian pear trees got enough chilling to set fruit this year. Darn global warming.

The Fuyu persimmon tree appears to have set four fruit. The brown part is the dried petals of the inconspicuous flower. The swollen green part under it is the ovary, soon to become a persimmon I hope. The green “petals” behind the tiny fruit are actually the sepals. Last year I had one fruit, and it fell off at about this stage, so I’m not counting on a harvest quite yet.

I just finished planting two self-watering planters with Sequoia strawberries. They are June-bearing rather than ever-bearing. I may have planted them too late to get much of a harvest this year. We’ll see. I’m out of space in the yard, so this is one more thing that I’m growing in my driveway.

The first tendrils on my Cherokee Trail of Tears beans have reached the netting and are starting to curl up the string. Once they do that, the vines really take off and grow. This is another of my space-saving techniques, using this useless little strip of dirt by the gas meter to grow crops.

The raised beds in back look like a jungle, not that I’m complaining. It’s mostly tomatoes and peppers, with some kale, leeks, Brussels sprouts that aren’t making any sprouts, etc.

My tomatoes are beginning to set fruit. This is a Mortgage Lifter.

This is a new variety for me, Box Car Willie, named after a country singer of the 1930s. Such a cool name. I hope they taste good. The only other tomato to set fruit so far is a Black Plum, another new variety for me.

My second crop of Mammoth Snow Peas for the year has begun to flower. My Super Sugar Snaps aren’t far enough along yet to flower.

It is going to be touch and go if I get any Grandpa Admire lettuce. Out of 23 sprouts, this is the only one to survive. Either insects or drought got all but three. Then a neighborhood cat used my raised bed as a litter box and killed the other two. Such is gardening.

This misshapen, misbegotten thing is supposed to be a Golden Bell pepper. It has a long way to go before it is ready to harvest.

This is one of the mystery pumpkins or winter squash that sprouted from my compost pile. I transplanted it and will let it grow for a while. I should at least get some squash blossoms from it. To save space, I like to let my winter squash climb up a tomato cage. Works for butternut squash. Probably won’t work for a heavier pumpkin.

Our semi-dwarf navel orange tree has set fruit. It looks like we’ll have a good crop next winter. I still have a few more oranges left to harvest from this year’s crop, but they’re about gone.

This appears to be full bloom for grapes. Not very impressive. But I’m excited to be growing my first grapes. It took the vines 3-4 years to get large enough to bloom, and this will be my first crop.

These green bunching onions have just sprouted. If you look closely, you can still see the black seed covers. I grow green onions in pots due to lack of yard space.

Our last three artichokes. We had them for dinner tonight.

I planted a fourth fabric container of yams yesterday, plus two containers of Japanese eggplant. The potatoes in the fourth container back from the front are nearing harvest. They’re either blue or German butterball.

New raised bed in front.

Redhead radish

Kyoto red carrots

Cucumbers, either Tendergreen Burpless or Straight Eight. I can hardly wait for cucumber soup.

I’m working now on the bare area to the back right of my new raised bed. I plan to put in some tomatoes and pole beans there, with pumpkins on a small lower terrace out of sight in this picture.

A pretty pink rose.

This is the first year that this variety of iris has bloomed for me. It has been a really good year for irises in my yard.

That completes the photo tour of my garden. On to this week’s harvest.

FRUIT

1 lb Avocados

10 oz Lemon, Eureka

4 lbs 8 oz Peaches, Florida Prince

Subtotal fruit 6 lbs 2 oz

VEGETABLES

2 lbs 10 oz Artichokes

7 oz Bok Choy

1 lb 4 oz Cabbage, Red

1 oz Onion, Green

Subtotal Vegetables 4 lbs 6 oz

TOTAL PRODUCE 10 lbs 8 oz plus 11 eggs

If you had a harvest, or to see what others are harvesting, visit Daphne’s Dandelions.

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200th Blog Post–Harvest Monday and Kitchen Cupboard Thursday

Posted on May 11, 2012 | 2 Comments

Phew, I am really running behind this week. I didn’t get my Harvest Monday post done this week, even though I had a nice harvest to report. But I did get a new raised bed constructed and planted. See my last post. At this point, I’m hoping to get my Thursday “what I used from my garden and preserved harvest” post done before midnight. And… this marks my 200th blog post.

First, a feast for the eyes, a lovely orchid cactus in bloom.

So, before I go on to my harvest and use thereof, let me direct your attention to the World Map at the right. This app keeps track of where my visitors live. My blog has been visited by people from every state in the US, and people from 182 other countries. Since I don’t think that there are even that many countries in existence, that is quite remarkable. And since my blog is in English, it makes me wonder what brings all those people here. I would guess photos. Or maybe they get here by mistake. Who knows. I just hope they find something useful or that makes them happy.

This is the largest cabbage that I’ve ever grown. It weighed 3 lbs. It split, but I cleverly didn’t show you that side of the cabbage. I have another one, the last one, ready to pick this week.

I have potatoes growing in the fabric Gro-pot at the lower right, and yams in the other two pots. I’m about to plant my third and last pot of yams from slips growing on the kitchen windowsill. This is the largest that my potato plants have ever gotten, so I am hoping for a good harvest soon.

After not producing avocados for 15 years, my Littlecado tree finally did itself proud this year. I am harvesting two a week, which is the rate at which we consume them. They don’t ripen until picked. I have maybe 9-10 left on the tree, so the harvest isn’t over yet.

Whoopee, my first harvest of the year of Florida Prince peaches. They are pathetically small because I just didn’t thin them enough. Now I am faced with tiny fruits that are mostly seed. But boy are they tasty! Sweet and succulent, dripping with juice. I had some for breakfast this morning with granola.

First, my harvest for the week.

Harvest for week ending May 6, 2012.

FRUITS

14 oz Avocados

12 oz Orange, Navel

1 lb 6 oz Peaches, Florida Prince

Subtotal 3 lbs

VEGETABLES

12 oz Artichokes

3 lbs Cabbage, Red

1 oz Lettuce, Deer Tongue

Subtotal 3 lbs 13 oz

TOTAL PRODUCE 6 lbs 13 oz plus 10 eggs

If you had a harvest, or to see what others around the world are harvesting, visit Daphne’s Dandelions. See hot links at right.

On to what I made with my harvest. I made a batch of Meyer lemon-ginger marmalade, but I’ll post the recipe for that on another post because I’m running out of time and energy. I still want to bake a peach pie tonight with some of my Florida Prince peaches.

This smoked salmon fritatta was made with eggs from my hens, avocado and green onion from my garden, sliced cheese, and some smoked salmon. Wish I had more of that salmon, because it was YUMMY. Wish I could spell frittata. Frittatta. Whatever.

I made a beef stew with cubed boneless chuck roast, diced potatoes, an onion, a bunch of carrots sliced, and a can of my homemade tomato soup. I put two bay leaves on top from our tiny potted bay laurel tree.

I cooked the stew in our Sun Oven solar oven. I just love that thing and have been using it 2-3 times a week, saving energy and fighting global warming. The stew was done and tender after 4 hours. I swear, food tastes better when it is cooked in a solar oven. The flavors blend and mingle and meats are so tender it is amazing. But now that I look at the photo, I can see that it is white and sweet potatoes that are baking in it. They were great too.

We had the stew with cornbread and orange-honey butter.

Orange-honey Butter

1 stick of butter softened in microwave for 10 seconds

1 T orange rind grated with microplane grater

2 t honey

Blend with a fork. Great on blueberry pancakes, biscuits, cornbread, English muffins, etc.

Did somebody say blueberry pancakes? That’s what we had for breakfast the other day, made with blueberries from the farmers market, topped with 100% pure maple syrup and orange-honey butter made with orange rind from my own oranges, and… orange wedges.

If you used something from your kitchen cupboard or to see recipes from others, visit Robin at The Gardener of Eden.

I am now debating whether or not I have enough energy left in the evening to bake a peach pie. Arg, I wouldn’t get it into the oven until 10 pm and it wouldn’t come out until 11. That is a “not happenin’ activity” for tonight. Manana, muchachos y muchachas.

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Spring flowers and summing up the harvest so far this year

Posted on April 10, 2012 | 18 Comments

Spring has sprung with a vengeance in our yard. Flowers are popping out everywhere it seems. I’m going to show you some of my pretty flowers before getting to the food harvest.

Ida Red is a new color of bearded iris, the reddest of the irises. I got this one from http://www.greenwoodgarden.com. I just love it. When it's ready to divide in the fall, I plan to interplant it with some nice white irises.

Dutch iris are non-native, but this Douglas Iris is native to California. I just love these. I'm thinking that I should get some more to plant around the pond.

This is the purple Pacific or Douglas iris. I also have a white one, but it isn't in bloom at the moment. They are good plants for riparian habitats, areas that are watered to get 32 inches of rain a year. I cluster my riparian plants to conserve water.

My paperwhites stopped blooming long ago. The Tahiti Narcissus just finished. Now it's the turn of these lovelies.

Another view. The first photo showed these narcissus a bit more yellow than they really are.

The whole back yard that isn't in raised beds is covered in nasturtiums. I feed the leaves to the chickens. They don't seem to care much for the flowers. I tried making nasturtium vinegar one year by soaking the flowers in white vinegar for several days, but I didn't really care much for the flavor. Tasted like nasturtiums!

The first rose of summer is about to open. Summer? It's APRIL!

I bought two new cymbidium orchids, the yellow and the rust-colored ones, to add to my existing white and pink one. They look nice in a set of three.

Pink cobbity daisies in the front yard. I want more, but haven't found them at the nursery when I've looked.

My two early season camellias have finished blooming. Now it is the turn of this late season one.

This is the largest bud on my orchid cactus. When they open, they're spectacular, as large as my fully opened and wide-stretched hand. I have two color varieties, a pinky peach and a salmon.

OK, none of those were edible, except for the nasturtiums. I put them in for beauty alone. Here are some flowers which promise fruit in the future.

My Granny Smith dwarf apple tree is in full bloom. It normally sets about 30 full-size apples. The Gala and Fuji apples are still dormant, as are my two Asian pear trees. However, we had a warm winter, and they might not have received enough chilling to set fruit. Darn global warming!

Our Santa Rosa plum is blooming poorly, as usual. We'll be lucky to get a dozen plums. However, that is more than we usually get since the night critters usually get all the fruit. This year I'm live-trapping them relentlessly. We've relocated seven possums already this year.

These are lime blossoms from my Bearrs lime tree. Note the tiny limes on the right. That's what they look like after the petals fall off. Most of the flowers don't result in fruit, but we get plenty of limes from the tree anyway. The navel orange and Meyer lemon trees are also in exuberant bloom.

These itsy, bitsy little green flower buds are the ones that are exciting me the most. They are the first ever flowers on my Red Flame Seedless grape vines. I planted the vines four years ago (or was it three, can't remember) and they are now showing signs of producing fruit. We have eight clusters of flowers so far, and more may open as the grape vines are just now getting going for the summer. I hope we get actual grapes but a lot of things can happen between now and harvest. Mold, mites, birds, night critters, etc. I have my fingers crossed.

My Mammoth snow peas are up. They sure aren't mammoth at this stage. This is the second planting of 2012.

My red cabbages are coming along. In general, my cole crops did poorly this winter. I think it was too warm for them. But I have three remaining red cabbages and all have made heads. They're too small to harvest yet though. I hope they make it to harvest time.

We've harvested and eaten three artichokes so far, with more coming along. I had four artichoke plants that came back from the roots this year. They are a short-lived perennial. I may have to replant this fall. Or maybe I'll get another year out of the existing plants. Time will tell.

Our Florida Prince Peach tree is loaded with fruit, about 250 peaches. Last year, they were very small peaches. I hope that they're bigger this year and worth canning. I thinned out the peaches a bit, hoping that the remaining ones would get large, but I probably didn't thin enough. I just can't bear to pick them off as tiny babies. I want them ALL to grow big.

This is another view of the Florida Prince Peach. The Babcock Improved Peach is nearly finished blooming, and it looks like it might set 100 fruit this year. The August Pride Peach, which is probably a mis-labeled May Pride, has only three peaches on it. Our Panamint nectarine has set about 30-40 nectarines. The Snow Queen nectarine is just now blooming, but fruit set isn't likely to exceed a dozen. Our poor little Katy Apricot set only three apricots this year. The critters usually get all of the apricots anyway. I keep hoping to get some for myself.

It isn't a plant, but I wanted to show you that I'm still using my new solar oven. I've baked 6 loaves of bread in it so far, plus lamb and lentil curry, beef stew, pot roast, chicken, etc. Amazing thing, it cooks with just the heat of the sun. I'm fighting global warming every way I can.

I’ve done a pretty good job of keeping up with the Excel spreadsheet of my harvests this year, if not getting around to blogging as often as I’d like.

Here is a summary of what my garden has produced so far this year. Note that this is the production for my first quarter, not for the week.  The harvest for this week was 1 oz green onions, 12 oz artichokes, and 8.5 oz of yams.

EGGS, 144 (Yeah, hens! Way to go.)

FRUIT, 43 lbs

Avocados, 111 ounces

Lemons, 110 ounces

Limes, 10.5 ounces

Oranges, 453 ounces

VEGETABLES, 33 lbs

Artichokes, 22 oz

Beets, 160 oz = 10 lbs

Broccoli, 46 oz

Cabbage, 85 oz

Carrots, 50 oz

Cauliflower, 15 oz

Chard, 28 oz

Eggplant, 2.5 oz

Herbs, 2.5 oz

Kale, 4.5 oz

Komatsuna, 6 oz

Lettuce, 4 oz

Mizuna, 5 oz

Onions, green, 2.5 oz

Peas, Snow, 72 oz

Spinach, 1 oz

Tomatoes, 8 oz

Yams, 8.5 oz

TOTAL PRODUCE, 76 lbs

To see what others are harvesting, visit Daphne’s Dandelions.

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Blooming Monday, March 12 2012

Posted on March 13, 2012 | 8 Comments

Wow, spring is just bursting out all over in our yard. In addition to updating my harvest, I want to show some pics of stuff in bloom.

Our Katy apricot tree had very few blossoms this year, so I'm not anticipating much of a crop. Actually, the birds and night critters usually get all the apricots anyway.

This is our Katy apricot. There are few blooms on it this year, so I’m not anticipating much of a crop. The night critters generally get the entire harvest anyway, but I’ve been live trapping the possums relentlessly this spring. Haven’t caught one in over a week, so maybe I’ve really been able to move them out of our yard.

This Garden Gold peach is a dwarf. This is the first year that it's had any significant number of blossoms on it, so maybe I'll get to see what this variety of peach tastes like.

The Florida Prince Peach sets fruit really early in the season. This year it set a record number of peaches. I'm really hoping that I have some to can for the first time ever. If not, then we'll have our usual peach pie, peach cobbler, and sliced peaches on cereal and ice cream. I can hardly wait.

Our Panamint nectarine also has a record number of blossoms. It generally gives us a good amount of fruit, but I don't know what to do with nectarines other than eat them fresh. I've heard that they don't can well. I'm wondering if anyone makes nectarine pie or freezes them. I'm pretty sure that they would make good jam, but have never tried it. This is going to be the year!

My three raised beds in the back yard are doing well. The winter crops are nearly finished, and it's time to think about summer crops. Tomatoes! Yeehah!

The back yard raised beds are looking great. Don’t ask about the community garden. The powers that be (Southern California Edison) are still dithering about what we can and can’t have there. I’ve put in three separate fences, put in beautiful redwood raised beds that had to be removed, and a cute little garden flag that also didn’t meet with their approval. I had to remove my first set of vinyl coated wire tomato cages, as well as my fiberglass coated tomato stakes and my bean trellis. They’ve said no decorations, no raised beds, no metal, no trellises higher than four feet (ever try to grow pole beans on a four-foot trellis? Ridiculous.)  I already bought five varieties of pole beans for this year before that new ruling came out!)

I spent $1500 on that garden plot last year, which was really just a hard-compacted gravel parking lot, and got very little produce out of it because of poor soil and rabbits. I’ll be darned if I’m going to waste my time and money on it until they get their stupid minds made up about what they are and aren’t going to allow. Part of the problem is one cranky person whose property backs up to the Edison property. She didn’t want the gardens there, so to appease her, they are saying no decorations and no chairs in the gardens.  She sued the city anyway for allowing the gardens there.

Fortunately, they do allow plastic storage bench seating such as the bench seat that I bought. I’m old and have to sit down between short bouts of labor. That is the ONLY thing that I bought for my garden that is still allowed.  Ah, but I digress. Back to happy springtime in MY yard. For now, to heck with the community garden.

Yippee, our hens are laying again. We get three eggs a day on a good day, but overall we're getting 7-12 eggs a week. I just love having chickens.

Every spring, we get a pair of mallards that hangs out in our yard. They stay about six weeks. We think that our yard is a feeding territory since the female has never nested here. They swim in our little pond and scarf up any bird seed they find. I put out a bit of chicken feed for them too since I enjoy their visits.

Our mallards are "park ducks" that come up to be fed instead of flying away when I open the front door.

I planted a butterfly garden and the butterflies actually use it. We had 10 monarch caterpillars this year on the bloodflower milkweed. They ate the plants down to bare sticks, which is what happens if you're raising butterflies.

This is a monarch chrysalis, with a bit of sun flare in the photo.

My butterfly garden has a variety of sages, lantana, bloodflower milkweed and yarrow in it. We get a number of different species of butterflies coming for nectar, and if any of them lay eggs, they’re safe in our yard. No pesticides or herbicides in our all organic yard. Cabbage loopers and tomato hornworms are not safe, however. I feed them to the chickens or squash them if I find them.

Camellia

Mt Hood daffodil

Kafir lily

Freesias in the marjoram

OK, on to the food section.

Stuffed breast of lamb

We bought a side of lamb a couple of years back, and still had this cut in the freezer, a breast of lamb. I had the butcher cut a pocket in it when we had the meat processed. Finally got around to cooking it. Stuffed it with bread stuffing with onions, celery, raisins and one of the last apples from our fall harvest. I put diced potatoes with rosemary from the garden around the edge, and roasted the whole thing. Delicious.

This beautiful loaf of challah bread uses two eggs from our chickens. I make the dough in the bread machine, braid it, and bake it in the oven. Really easy.

I didn’t take pictures of my harvest this week. Indeed, not for many, many weeks now. But I have had harvests. I’m getting citrus and avocados galore. I’ve been making sorbets with the citrus and they’re coming out really good. I mix orange, lemon and lime juice for the sorbets.

Some oranges went into this pecan-cranberry orange cake shown below. It doubles as dessert or a breakfast bread, since I didn’t bother to ice the cake. An avocado and some cream cheese went into scrambled eggs this morning. Thank you, chickens, for the eggs.

Breakfast this morning was so late that it turned out to be brunch. Homegrown eggs with homegrown avocado and store-bought cream cheese can't be beat.

On to the harvest for this week and last.

Harvest Monday Feb 27-March 11, 2012

FRUIT

12 oz avocado

4 oz lemon, Meyer

5 oz limes

17 oz oranges, Navel

Subtotal 38 oz. or 2 lbs 6 oz.

VEGETABLES

8 oz broccoli

0.5 oz green onions

3 oz kale, Lacinato

1 oz parsley

4 oz snow peas

Subtotal 16.5 oz or 1 lb 0.5 oz

TOTAL PRODUCE 3 lbs 6.5 oz. for two weeks

EGGS 8 + 12 = 20 eggs for two weeks

 

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First Harvest Monday of 2012

Posted on January 10, 2012 | 7 Comments

My garden year is off to a rip-roaring start. My harvest goal for 2012 is  an ambitious 350 lbs. I say ambitious because that is 115 lbs more than I’ve grown in either of the past two years.

Snow peas and cabbage went into a yaki soba (Japanese stir-fried noodle dish) along with a few other vegetables.

However, that amount is nothing compared to what gardeners in the Midwest and East Coast are able to produce with their large yards. They report 750-1000 lbs of produce. Wow. I can only imagine.

Orange juice and zest went into a Colonial Williamsburg Lodge Orange Cake, which is a dense cake made with pecans and raisins.

I have a tiny yard plus a small community garden plot. So my goals are more modest. But can I grow a third more produce this year than last year in the same space? Dunno. My fruit trees are more mature this year and that should really help.

Both my dwarf navel orange and semi-dwarf avocado trees are producing bumper crops this year. But given the small size of the trees, 50 oranges and 20 avocados on each tree constitutes a bumper crop.

Reaching my harvest goal will require more diligent attention to my garden and more vigorous control of the night critters than I managed last year. I constantly battle bunnies, rats, opossums and raccoons for the right to eat what I labor to grow. Last year I lost the battle and the night critters got a good part of my harvest, including all of the apricots and most of my peaches and nectarines.

Snow peas, spinach, Deer Tongue and Black Seeded Simpson lettuces, avocado and carrots made a fine salad, all from my garden.

I picked 350 lbs as a goal because it is about half of the amount of fresh fruit and vegetables that the average American couple consumes annually. Surely I can grow half of our fresh produce needs. I also hope the hens will produce at least 350 eggs, but that is pretty much beyond my control. It is more a function of their age and health.

Miss Hillary, our newest hen, provided four eggs for our dinner. I made baked roast beef hash and eggs along with the salad, which was topped with pine nuts.

To reach my harvest goals, I will need to average nearly 7 lbs of produce a week (7 x 52 = 364). Last January, I harvested a bit over 7 lbs in the entire month.

Well, I’m off to a rousing start this year with a “first week in January” harvest of over 9 lbs! Woohoo!

Winter is citrus and avocado season. Here are three navel oranges, three Meyer lemons, a Eureka lemon, a lime, and a crazy lone tomato that ripened in January.

But more important than my poundage goals are my other gardening goals for 2012. I want to try new varieties to tickle my taste buds. I want to have FUN with my garden. I want to savor and enjoy the healthy organic produce that I grow. And I want my garden to be beautiful as well as productive.

As far as growing new varieties, I have already placed an order with Native Seed/SEARCH, a non-profit that offers heirloom seeds from Native people of the American Southwest and Mexico. I plan to plant Hopi Black Beans, Taos Red Beans, Chihuahuan Ojo de Cabra (Eye of the Goat) beans, and Frijole Chivita. I will also plant European Soldier Beans, one of the finest tasting soup beans I’ve ever had, as well as Cherokee Trail of Tears, a lovely dried black bean that I have grown before.

In the winter squash and gourd category, I ordered Mayo Cushaw, Calabaza de las Aguas, Mayo Blusher, and Navajo Gray Hubbard squashes as well as Mayo Gooseneck gourds. I can hardly wait to plant them and see what I get.

Here is my first week’s harvest for 2012, a propitious start.

FRUIT
22 oz Avocados
17.5 oz Lemons
3.5 oz Lime
56 oz Oranges

SUBTOTAL 6.2 lbs FRUIT

VEGETABLES
22 oz Cabbage, green
2 oz Carrots
2.5 oz Eggplant, Japanese
1.5 oz Herbs
1.5 oz Kale, Lacinato
3 oz Lettuce, BSS and Deer Tongue
11 oz Snow Peas
1 oz Spinach
2 oz Tomato, Beefsteak

SUBTOTAL 3.2 lbs VEGETABLES

TOTAL 9.3 lbs PRODUCE plus 4 eggs

Visit Daphne’s Dandelions to see what others harvested this week.

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Last Harvest Monday of 2011 and I have a harvest!

Posted on December 27, 2011 | 13 Comments

This past week hasn’t been too bad, considering that we left for our Christmas vacation on Monday Dec. 19 and didn’t get back until yesterday, Sunday Dec. 25. I headed straight to the garden in back to see what I could scrounge for our Christmas dinner. We had yaki-soba and a key lime pie. Kinda strange, but that’s what the harvest yielded.

Our travels took us to Albuquerque to see the candelaria on Christmas eve and to get in some winter birding/photography. We arrived just as their major winter snow storm was starting, but by constantly monitoring the weather channel on my iPad and planning accordingly, we were able to dodge the bullet on bad weather. I took 900 pics, and will make a post on our trip after I process the photos. That’s going to take some time.

My community garden plot is looking sad. The nice redwood borders have been removed, as per the new garden rules. The nice green vinyl covered wire fence that kept out the rabbits has been removed, as per the garden committee rules. The plastic chicken fencing was completely ineffective at keeping out the rabbits, so I put up some white trellis fencing, but still haven't finished the job.

Meanwhile, back to the garden. My community garden plot gardening area is in the shape of the letter E, with gravel paths. The plot came with compacted gravel since this area had been a parking lot for heavy construction equipment. The kid that I hired to rototill the garden initially didn’t dig very deep, so my plot wasn’t as productive this year as I would have liked. Well, a new season is coming up.

Looking southeast at my community garden plot in December.

I still have beets, carrots, chard, garlic, onions, mizuna and komatsuna growing, plus a couple of tomatoes, peppers, and eggplants that I’m going to attempt to overwinter. If we don’t get a frost, they’ll revive come spring. I hope. Because they sure didn’t give me much this past growing season.

Avocados take about 10-14 days of sitting on the counter to ripen enough to eat. They don't ripen on the tree. Then it's a race to see if we catch them in time or if they go past readiness. This is the first year than my LittleCado tree has set much fruit, about 20 avocados. Most of the harvest will be in 2012.

I need to finish the fencing and put up plastic edging before spading up the soil and adding more amendments. Then I can put in winter crops like broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower, radishes, peas, etc. I have those growing now in my home garden (except for radishes), so those would be a second or third crop for me.

Surprisingly, I had two late eggplants in my garden. I put this one in a yaki-soba stirfry last night.

Here is what I harvested from my home garden this week.

Yesterday's harvest included a lime and a Meyer lemon that went into a key lime pie, plus broccoli and snow peas that went into the yaki-soba. That was our Christmas dinner after getting back late from the airport.

Harvest Monday ending Dec. 25, 2011

FRUIT

4.5 oz. lemon, Meyer

4 oz. lime

Subtotal fruit 8.5 oz.

VEGETABLES

1 lb 4 oz avocados

4 oz broccoli

11 oz eggplant, Black Beauty

2.5 oz peas, snow

Subtotal 37.5 oz or 2 lbs 11.5 oz

TOTAL PRODUCE 3 lbs 3.6 oz, but no eggs

Hey, that’s not bad for late December. After Dec. 31, I’ll add up my total harvest for the year. It’s going to fall far short of my goal. There’s always next year. To see what others are harvesting, visit Daphne’s Dandelions.

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Running harvest totals–will I harvest 300 lbs this year?

Posted on August 10, 2011 | 2 Comments

I’ve just added a sidebar with harvest poundage, divided into fruits and vegetables. I also put in the totals from 2010, which is when I began weighing my harvests. Learned that from the rest of you garden bloggers. But keeping up with the spreadsheet on Excel is tedious. I seem to run out of time and/or steam. At least for now, I’m up to date for this year.

Navel orange--I ate this one for breakfast this morning and it was incredibly sweet

We have dwarf fruit trees and small raised beds in a tiny southern California yard, plus a rabbit-infested community garden plot that is on a former gravel parking lot. My harvests can’t compare with the huge hauls that I see on other gardening blogs, but it’s enough for us.

My dwarf avocado tree has a good fruit set this year for the first time ever, about 21 avocados.

I harvested 224 lbs last year from my yard. I had hoped for 500 lbs this year with the addition of my new community garden plot. But that little plot hasn’t been as productive as I had hoped, and rats and possums ate almost all of the fruit harvest in our yard this year. As a result, I’ve downgraded my harvest goal to 300 lbs. At this point, I doubt that I’ll even reach that figure given that it’s already August and I have harvested only 130 lbs. Will I be harvesting another 170 lbs in the next five months? I seriously doubt it. Not with all of our night critters.

I trapped yet another possum last night, the fourth one in four weeks. We managed to kill one rat, but I suspect that’s just a drop in the proverbial bucket. I’m typing this at night and I can hear the dang rats running around on our neighbor’s peach trees. Hey, at least I don’t have to contend with deer.

Granny Smith apple

I’ve managed to make and freeze only two quarts of spaghetti sauce so far this summer. I don’t see a heck of a lot of new tomatoes coming along, so that may be it. But my larder is certainly not bare. I still have tomato soup and spaghetti sauce that I canned last year, plus a large assortment of jams and preserves. I made a gallon jar of dill pickles last year and we’re still working on that.

Amish pie pumpkin

Mostly what I grow in my garden is hope. I dream of future harvests. And that’s what these photos are of: future harvests. For example, the Amish pie pumpkins like the one above are supposed to grow up to 90 lbs. Well, I got several beautiful pumpkins this year, but they were mostly between 1 and 2 lbs. Each one will make one pie. And that’s fine. I don’t need a hundred pumpkin pies.

This is pretty much it for my blackberry harvest. I get a few each week, but don't even bother to weigh them. I just pop them right into my mouth.

And that’s how my garden grows.

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Sweaty Sunday May 30 2010

Posted on May 31, 2010 | 6 Comments

Phew, I worked in my garden until it got dark today. My last post on how much is undone in the garden embarrassed me enough that I toiled from sunup to sundown today. Got a LOT done, including resting in front of the telly during the heat of the afternoon. It got up into the low 80s out there today.

First of all, I planted my new Haas avocado tree. Although it didn’t take very long, I consider that my major accomplishment of the day given how long the tree is likely to last. I have great hopes for this little dear as it has already set seven avocados. That’s two more than my mature Littlecado, which has five on it this year. I’m hoping that Littlecado, which isn’t supposed to need another tree for pollination, will enjoy having the Haas nearby and will set more fruit in the future. So far it has been a pathetic producer.

After that, I raked up fallen leaves from the Littlecado avocado and composted them. Trimmed the ferns and composted them too. Watered both compost bins. It’s time to take some compost out of the bottom trap door, but I didn’t get around to that today.

I fertilized all of the fruit trees in the back yard except the avocados, which don’t need it. Hmmm. Well, that’s not exactly right. I always plant with E.B. Stone Organic Sure Start fertilizer because it contains beneficial soil microbes and nutrients to get the plants off to a healthy start. So the Haas avocado tree got Sure Start to get it going. Then I watered all of my trees and the flower border. I admired my dwarf Granny Smith apple in particular. It has nearly 3 dozen apples on it this year. Don’t know if they’ll all make it to harvest time in September or not, but so far they look good. The Fuji seems to have set only one apple and the Gala none. Nothing from the Red Flame grapes either. I’m hoping for both grapes and Gala apples next year as it will be their third year in the ground.

I took down the string and wooden trellises from the spent sugar snap peas (I pulled the pea vines, which were covered in powdery mildew, and put them in the trash two days ago) and put up a new string trellis for my pole beans. Planted 60 Blue Lake Pole Beans and 10 Scarlet Runner Beans.

I harvested the last two Candid Charm cauliflower heads to make room in the raised beds for some poor stunted seedlings that I started from seed back in February. They should have gone into the ground before this, but space is just now opening up in the raised beds. Planted 2 Black Beauty Eggplants, 2 Green Savoy Cabbages, 1 Black Krim Tomato, 1 Mortgage Lifter Tomato, and 4 Brandywine Tomatoes.

We ate the last of our Florida Prince peaches for breakfast today in pancakes, along with the first tiny harvest of blueberries and the day’s harvest of strawberries.

Over the past three years I’ve reworked my garden so that it will produce more fruits and vegetables. This is the summer that it is really starting to pay off. The amounts of my harvests aren’t large, but I love the variety of produce that I’m getting from our small yard. It’s so much fun playing with growing new varieties, and seeing what will produce in pots and planters as well as in the ground. Happy gardening to you all.

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