Pollination is a Beautiful Thing-

Yesterday, while Magun and I were in the back yard looking at cucumbers, we noticed a friend visiting one of Stephanie's sunflowers. The only word that came to mind was "Beautiful."

Cukes--

We picked our first pickling cucumber yesterday at the Summer Garden. It is a National Pickling variety with seeds from Annie's Heirloom Seeds. Now, we need to figure out how long it will last until we get enough to can. Also, we have several Silver Slicers ripening at both spots. Silver Slicers are big slicing cucumbers and the color should be quite striking.

Magun with the first pickler-

                                     

Magun showing off the Silver Slicers-

   

Summer Garden with Magun June 26

Yesterday, Magun and I went over to the Summer Garden to tie up the corn. The Summer Garden would have never happened if my little buddy (Mr. Simons) has not be so supportive. Young corn seems to fall over in the storms, so we did an improv Florida weave for the corn. While we were there, Magun discovered some Rattlesnake Beans, the she discovered a Marketmore Cucumber. After that, she help me with another level of the Florida weave for the tomatoes. We checked the melon patch. There are now 3 Sivan F1 Melon babies. The Moon and Stars Watermelon leaves are beginning to get their splash of color. Low and behold, we checked the eggplant and cucumber patch on the way out and found 3 very nice pickling cucumbers forming. Come on veggies--GROW!!!

Magun holding a National Pickling Cucumber-

Magun discovered our first Rattlesnake Beans-

A wawnky looking Marketmore cucumber-

Moon and Stars Watermelon vine getting its splash-

Sivan F1 Hybrid Melon (single serving cantaloupe) 

The Home Place

Aside from the chickens and the mushrooms, we have tried to create a well rounded completely organic garden at our house. To keep organic we use compost and bat guano for fertilizer and use a oil/baking soda mixture and 70% Neem Oil for pest control. The pictures below will show a lot about it. But there is nothing better than eating my wife's great zucchini bread with a squash from the back yard or adding some fresh dill and lavender to a veggie dish or adding some basil and oregano to a steak marinate. Anyway, it started with a raised bed made out of recycled 2 x 4's. Then we added leaves and 500 earth worms-Uncle Jim's Worm Farm. From there we were off. We tilled some other spots in the back yard and has some successes and some failures. The red and gold beets did not do well neither did the radishes, okra, or beans, but the Summer Garden is making up for that. We have tomatoes (sugar cherry, yellow brandywine, hillbilly, Arkansas traveler), peppers (CA Bell), and strawberries (early and ever bearing varieties)  in the raised garden . We have some awesome zucchini, parsnips, rainbow carrots, broccoli, brussel sprouts, sugar pearl corn, and my fair lady corn, silver slicer cucumbers, black mountain watermelons, and tall and dwarf sunflowers in the other gardens in the back yard. There is a Brown Turkey Fig on the opposite of the yard for preserves.  Below are some photos-

The Start of the Home Garden and the Greenhouse-

Strawberries with a pot of Lavender (Lavender is supposed to help strawberries produce more

Dwarf Sunspot Sunflowers-

Baby Silver Slicer (White) Cucumbers-

Flower Patch-

Blueberries (Climax)-

Tomatoes in the raised bed with bird netting-

Sunflowers and Corn-

My Fair Lady Corn-

Sugar Pearl Corn-

Dark Green Zucchini-

The Home Garden looking south-

Parsnips (I feel a root bake coming some)-

Compost

We started a compost bin-the black one and have 2 metal trash cans as well. We also have three leave compost piles around the yard. The black composter has 2000 red wriggler worms from Uncle Jim's Worm Farm in it. Wow-those things can eat and poop. The compost goes in the raised garden and the corn garden at home. What a great way to get rid of scraps and feed the family. The leaf piles have made a great mulch for the rows.

The Compost-

'Shrooms

I would never thought to grow mushrooms-thanks again Becca and Eric, but they seem to be pretty easy. We had an oak cut down and saved the wood. The tree was growing into the inn so we had to have it removed anyway. We ordered 100 Maitake and 100 Shitake spore plugs from Living Whole Foods. In December, I drilled holes in the logs and hammered the spores on wooden plugs in and then covered the wholes with bees wax. Now we just wait, we should start seeing mushrooms in about another year--

The inoculated logs-

                                   

















                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       


Another view-If you look closely at the center log you will see white spots. Those are the spores covered with wax.

The Chickens

As I said, it all started with some chickens. In our case, which came first the chicken or the egg--THE CHICKEN. We started with a Buff Orpington (Lovie), Wyandotte (Daisy), Favorelle (Mabel), and an Easter Egger (Cotton). Mabel has feathers on her feet and Cotton lays blue eggs. In April, we got three news chickens-- Black Australorp (Lila), Buff Orpinton (Nugget), and Barred Rock (Spotty or Speckles-she has 2 names you pick the one you like). The babies are laying yet but we get blue eggs from Cotton, dark brown eggs from mabel, and light brown eggs from Daisy. We get about 15 eggs per week right now. Here are some chicken pics:

The First Chicken House-Daisy, Cotton, and Mabel reside here-

                                                         


The Second Chicken House-Lila, Nugget, and Spotty/Speckles live here. One the babies are big enough, we will connect the 2-

                                                         


The Babies- Lila (left), Spotty/Speckles. and Nugget-

                                                                                                                     




The eggs-If you look close you will see the blue eggs. These are three lovely farm girls holding the eggs-

Summer Ave Tomatoes

Our tomatoes and peppers at the Summer Garden were located in another spot-We started then from seed in the Home Garden Greenhouse (April 2014) and then transplanted them to Summer (May 2014)
The Start-

                                                           
                                                         

June 20, 2014-
Tomatoes-Hillbilly, Yellow Brandywine, Sugar Cherry, and Arkansas Travler

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                             

Bangles Mini Mix Peppers

Summer Avenue Corn

We planted 2 rows of Luscious Corn and 2 rows of Sugar Pearl-they started fast and need some tying for support but we should have plenty of corn towards the end of the season-

Here is the start of the rows-

a few weeks later-

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      before some hand weeding-



after some hand weeding-

Jacon's Cattle Beans

Jacob's Cattle Beans:

Early June in bloom:

                                                                                                                                                                                                                             















                                                                                                                                                                                                             


June 20-pods forming:

Pole Beans-Jacon's Cattle Beans

We are growing 3 varieties of beans-Kentucky Wonder Pole Beans, Rattlesnake Beans, and Jacob's Cattle Bean. Kentucky Wonder are good old snap beans, Rattlesnake have red stripes and can be snap or dry beans, and Jacob's Cattle or  Appaloosa Beans are a dried bean--they are growing like magic beans-
Kentucky Wonder (left) and Rattlesnake (right)-

Late May--

June 20--

The Start of Summer

The garden on Summer took some work. There was a lot of stuff buried in the ground. All the NON-organic stuff went in one pile and all of the wood went in an another-
Below is a pile of the NON-

After numerous tillings and more removal. Shout out to Luba and Alex. It was time for some seeds-Shout out to Stephanie and Magun-

Then it was time to grow-and build twine bean webs-Shout out to Magun-

From there the garden took off-

The Catch-Up Background Info

I am trying to catch up with where we have been so far....here is some garden background:
2 gardens-1 at home and 1 on Summer. Some before and after photos are the next few posts:

Home Garden:
Red and Golden Beets: epic fail
Rainbow Carrots
Parsnips
Red Onions
Costa Romanesca Summer Squash
Hillbilly Tomatoes
Yellow Brandywine Tomatoes
Sugar Cherry Tomatoes
Arkansas Traveler Tomatoes
California Bell Peppers
Autumn Beauty Sunflowers
Dwarf Sunspot Sunflowers
Sugar Pearl Corn
My Fair Lady Corn
Silver Slicer Cucumbers

Summer Garden:
Kentucky Wonder Pole Beans
Rattlesnake Pole Beans
Jacobs Cattle Beans
Burgundy Okra
Clemson Spineless Okra
Sugar Pearl Sweet White Corn
Luscious Bi-Color Corn
Silver Slicer Cucumbers
Marketmore Cucumber
Homemade Pickles Cucumber
National Pickling Cucumber
Bangles Mini Max Peppers
California Wonder Cucumbers
Hillbilly Tomatoes
Yellow Brandywine Tomatoes
Sugar Cherry Tomatoes
Arkansas Traveler Tomatoes
Moon and Stars Watermelons
Blacktail Mountain Watermelons
Hale's Best Melons
Sivan F1 Hybrid Mini Melon
Black Beauty Eggplant

The Germination

It all began with a visit to Becca and Eric's house and seeing their chickens in urban St. Louis. Now, we have 6 chickens-(layers Cotton, Daisy, and Mabel and upstarts Lila, Nugget, and Speckles/Spotty). We lost one of our first and probably friendliest chickens (Lovie) to a hawk. From there, we moved on to a raised bed garden in the back yard. Then mushroom logs with Shiitake and Maitake. Then a larger garden in the back yard and then a second location in a yard on Summer Ave. Seeds for the gardens came from High Mowing Organic Seeds, Annie's Heirloom Seeds, and Seattle Seed Company. All of these seed companies were a great help for us to start and their catalogs provided a wealth of knowledge and inspiration. So lets recap-2 coops, 6 chickens, mushroom logs and two gardens. Thanks Becca (sarcasm) and thanks Becca-do to your inspiration we went out in our backyard last night for fresh oregano, basil, and sage for a marinate....more to come..

The First Chicken-Lovie

The Chickens began as a Mother's Day gift and now Stephanie tends to 6 chickens but her favorites are Cotton (left) and Lila...

Mabel, Cotton, Daisy, and Lovie