Planting in wood chips

Last week I had the city of St Petersburg deliver 6 cubic yards of their "regular mulch" to my house.  The mulch is free, but there is a delivery fee of $25.  Not a bad deal in my opinion.  I've been mulching all over the yard, but am really focused on re-mulching the back beds.  The 6" of mulch that we put down last November is pretty much completely decomposed so it needs to be done.  The first bed I re-mulched was the flower bed next to the patio.  In just a few days I'm seeing great results.  The Nasturtim (Alaska Mix) planted already is getting bigger, darker green leaves already, which indicates the mulch is a much needed organic matter improvement.

With this in mind I decided to go ahead and spread some seeds on the mulch, water them in and watch what happens.  I got to work mixing up all sorts of flowers and edibles and spread them around.

Flower and edible seed mix:

Nasturtium (Alaska Mix)
Columbine (Mckana's Mixed Colors)
Zinia (Dwarf Pumila Sprite Mixed Colors)
Coreopsis
Organic carrots (Deep Orange)
Lettuce (Iceburg)
Carrot (Petite Sweet)
Lettuce (Grand Rapids (Leaf))
Purple Coneflower

I also planted Colorful Beet Mix in the Earthbox and Detroit Dark Red Beets in the main garden bed.

If I can keep the moisture level in the wood chip bed I have a feeling the plants will take off!  Can't wait to see what happens!

Grow Your Own Food - November Garden Tour

November is a busy time here at The Florida Homestead.  There are so many things to plant, chickens to tend to, weeds to pull, mulch to lay, manure to shovel, raised beds to assemble and fill...I could spend 24 hours a day working on the homestead and never be finished.  I'm not complaining because I truly love this time of year.  The weather has been crisp and cool, making chores much more enjoyable.  And with the summer heat gone there are new signs of life sprouting up every day.

Two of the girls posing awkwardly for a picture.

Jalapeno plant (left) recovering from an unfound hornworm attack.  Thai pepper plants getting bigger (right).

The Ghost Pepper Plant has had a rough year.  Still alive, but so far only one pepper this year.

Another attempt at growing nasturtium.  Kinda dwarfed plant, but that says to me it needs some food.  It's not in a main bed so I keep forgetting to tend to it.

Green beans and yellow beans.  Yellow beans have beautiful purple flowers, but are NOT a good producer.

Watermellon plant is looking great (though I can't say the same for the variegated ginger plant next to it).

Random volunteer tomato with cilantro plants around the base.

The center pineapple looks great, but the two flanking it haven't grown at all yet.

Not sure if my blueberries will survive.  Both look like this.  I've added compost, epsom salts, coffee grounds and llama manure.  I haven't given up all hope yet though.

Italian Flat Leaf Parsley

Dill and Cilantro seedlings.

Tiny swiss chard plant next to a cabbage.

The raised beds I installed for my girls.  Still working on filling them with soil, but the youngest mostly just digs and plays there anyway. 

Potted Plant Row where you'll find Calamondins, lemon grass, carrots, tomatoes, strawberries, radishes, papayas, peas, kohlrabi, broccoli and cabbage.

Tiny bell peppers.

Kohlrabi seedlings.

Two heads of cabbage.

Brussel Sprout seedlings.

Main bed.

Lots of lettuces planted.  The lighter yellow-green plants have my favorite name..."Drunken Woman Lettuce."

Carrots

Spaghetti Squash volunteer in the compost bin.

Several varieties of radishes planted in the bed.

Beets

Peas!  Fingers crossed they do well.  I've never had success with peas before and am excited to see they seem to be thriving so far.

Lots of green papays 

It's almost time to thin the turnips.  I typically do not transplant thinning, but wonder how they'd do if I tried a few.

Papaya plant is 6' tall now.

Spinach coming up.

Swiss Chard seedlings are finally getting their true leaves.

That's it for today!  Maybe next time I'll get the motivation to take pictures of the front yard too.

Todays Harvest

After months of seemingly endless scorching summer heat I was finally able to harvest a few fruits and vegetables today.  I can't wait until the cool weather comes and harvest yields increase.

6.6 oz Key Limes

1 lb 3.6 oz Starfruit

10.8 oz Baby Bibb Lettuce

2 oz green beans

I apologize for the sideways pictures.  Next time I take pictures from my phone I'll remember not to turn the phone when I do.  

Ordering Seeds

Have you ever cracked open a seed catalog?  Page upon page of beautiful ripe fruits and vegetables eagerly calling out to you, "Order me. Grow me. You will love me."  Geesh.  If I ordered every seed I thought I needed I'd be able to open a seed catalog of my own.

This year I decided to pass on ordering seed catalogs.  To simplify my life and my budget I opted to make a list of the fruits and veggies I buy the most and focus on growing those.

There are some ups and downs of this method, however, as much of what we like to eat take forever to grow here.

Our family favorites consist of:
Tomatoes (truth be told, we rarely buy tomatoes because no one eats them, but I want to grow a LOT because we eat a lot of spaghetti sauce & ketchup and I'd like to make my own.)
Broccoli (we can eat up to 2 lbs a day)
Lettuce (can't be grown in the Florida summer)
Spinach (had a good crop of this last year but it was so severely infested with aphids I finally pulled the crop)
Swiss Chard (a favorite green that tolerates both summer heat and our mild winters and doesn't have many bug problems in my experience)
Brussel Sprouts (I love roasted brussel sprouts but they cost an arm and a leg at the store so it's a rare treat for us)
Beets (Mmmm.  Roasted or pickled are our favorite)
Carrots (we eat at least 1 lb per week)
Cucumbers (not something we typically buy or eat, but we love homemade pickles and I'd like to put up enough for a year)
Melons (We prefer watermelon, but occasionally buy a cantaloupe)
Pumpkin (I would like to have enough canned to enjoy pumpkin pie year round)
Peppers (Husband eats these, but no one else does)

So while it can get overwhelming to browse seed catalogs I'm focusing on amending the soil and growing the fruits and veggies my family truly loves.

What are you planting this fall?

Parsley

I have had a bush of flat leaf parsley for almost 4 years now. Seems it is the one thing I don't naturally kill. Lol. I am glad because it has the nicest lemony scent and flavor. Picked 1 oz today to use in my Hopping John recipe. This should make the whole dinner delicious.

Homestead Update

Summer in Florida is brutal on plants.  It seems to be too hot and humid to get anything to grow successfully.  Come August and September it's really a huge time to start planting here.  Finally!

I found a great local source for bulk soil.  It's super cheap and is only 10 minutes from the Homestead.  I loaded up two garbage cans and a rubbermaid bin with soil for only $10!  It was enough to fill all of my pots and make a beet and lettuce raised bed.

The papaya tree is growing by leaps and bounds!  It seems to be one of the few plants that love our sandy alkaline soil.  I planted a Three Sisters garden too.  The squash seems to be doing well so far, but I lost half the corn to corn borers.  :(  Corn is a super heavy feeder so I don't think I'm going to replant until the soil is amended.  We got our FIRST YELLOW LEMON last week, but while I was driving my daughter to school someone stole it off the tree.  That confirmed that I need to relocate the trees to the back yard ASAP.  If we had huge trees I'd have no problem with someone coming up and taking what they need, but really?!?!?  We have three TINY trees and they walked up and stole the only lemon?!?!?  Geesh.  Lesson learned.  :/

In the past week I've been busy planting.  On 8/31 I posted this update, "Whew! Just planted Grand Rapids Lettuce, Red Deer Tongue Lettuce, Drunken Woman Lettuce, Cracoviensis Lettuce, Mibuna Mustard, Long Purple Eggplant, Listada de Gandia Eggplant, Louisiana Long Green (Green Banana) Eggplant, Detroit Dark Red Beets, Tropic VFN Tomatoes, Green Grape Cherry Tomatoes, De Milpa Tomatillos, White-Stemmed Pak Choi, Tokyo Bekana Chinese Cabbage, Radishes, Nasturtiums and Top Mark Muskmelon. And I still have tons more to plant!"


I posted this update on 9/1, "Lots more seeds went into the garden today. Marconi peppers, Spicy Banana Peppers, Datil Peppers, Chocolate Habaneros, Little Marvel (dwarf) peas, Roma Tomatoes, Kwand Hsi Hung Shih (tomatoes), Delicious 51 Muskmelon, Cherokee Wax (Yellow beans), Top Crop Green Beans, Hardin's Miniature Tomatoes, Danvers Half Long Carrots, Catskill Brussels Sprouts and Nutri-Red Carrots. Still have 7 pots, 4 flats and a GrowBox to plant, but I'm done for the day."

Today (9/8) I planted an organic Coloful Beet Mix and Paris Island Cos Lettuce in the raised bed.  My fingers are crossed that these grow well, as I haven't tried these varieties before.

I am hoping for a big harvest this season, as I started late in November last year and lost months of planting time.

We also got our first egg from the hens on 9/4.  Our hens were 20 weeks 3 days old.  So far only one is laying still, and we've only gotten 3 small pullet eggs, but we are SO excited to see months of love and care paying off.

I did some more research on how much I need to plant to feed a family of 4.  Here's the list I found:

Asparagus - 32 plants
Bush Beans - 360 plants (OMG, ARE THEY SERIOUS?!?!)
Beets - 180
Broccoli - 15 plants (we eat much more broccoli than this, so I may bump that up)
Cabbage - 15 plants (another food we eat a lot more of)
Carrots - 240
Cauliflower - 15 plants
Corn - 210 (Uh, there's no way I can grow 210 stalks of corn right now, so I'm not going to try yet)
Cucumber - 8 plants (I make a lot of pickles (family favorite) so I may need to at least double this)
Kohlrabi - 30 plants
Leaf Lettuce - 30 plants
Mustard - 4 plants
Green Onions - 120
Peas - 960 plants (GULP!  How on earth does someone plant almost 1000 pea plants?!?!)
Peppers - 10 plants (only one person in the family eats peppers, so I will reduce this)
Pumpkins - 3 (If you plant in Aug/Sept here you'll have a nice Christmas pumpkin)
Radishes - 120 (No one in my family eats radishes, but maybe I just need to find a mild variety)
Spinach - 20 plants
Squash - 3 plants (I'm in trouble then because I already have 20 growing)
Tomatoes - 15 plants (I plan on canning sauces for the year so I will need more)
Turnips - 45

So it seems that even though I've been planting a ton right now I still have my work cut out for me.  With the seemingly huge number of crops we need to grow to sustain us I need to expand the garden.  I've decided to utilize all available planting space in the back yard beds and amend them as I go.  Basically I'm going to dig a hole, fill it with compost and plant directly where I filled.  I think that will be the simplest, fastest, most affordable way to amend all of the beds.  If it doesn't work I guess I'll try again after this harvest.

Great Depression Recipes

http://countrytimerecipes.alphamaids.com/great_depression_recipes.htm

August 2012 Garden Layout

Here is the layout I have planned for the August 2012 planting.  As we all know, not everything always goes according to our plans, but I like to start with a basic idea of what I want to do in the garden.  I will be using the three sisters plantings on the left, lots of broccoli in the center, and other plants such as peppers, onions and okra on the right.

What do I do with all this stuff?

Totally off-topic post here, but I am so tired of living with so much stuff. It isn't exactly clutter, just stuff that only serves one purpose once in a while. We have been bitten in the past by getting rid of something only to think of a new use for it a day later all too often.

We do our best to reuse items to keep them out of the landfill. We donate stuff. We give stuff away. We sell stuff. We eventually toss stuff. But it seems like there is always more everywhere I turn.

I have read every organizing and decluttering book and blog I have been able to get my hands on. But the stuff never seems to go away.
I'm tired of moving stuff to clean stuff.  I am tired of storing stuff. I am tired of looking at stuff.

Every time I start going through my stuff I reminisce about my past life, before I was a wife and mother. I start remembering all the ideas I had for the stuff; projects I never finished, and often never started.  It makes me happy and sad at the same time. Often I get overwhelmed and just pack it back up and stick it back in the closet.

I tried not buying any more stuff and figured out it is almost impossible with kids.

I tried creating keep, toss, donate boxes, but never actually take the stuff with me because I am too tired to deal with it after I sort it.

I have tried listing stuff on trade groups, ebay, freecycle and craigslist to get rid of it. But there is no guarantee it will actually leave my house.  (Maybe that is how I justify keeping stuff.)

I have held yard sales - and made no money.

It is so hard to live with less when everything in your home has emotional or monitary value. Or when you suffer from guilt over throwing it in the landfills.

So what do I do now? How do I let go of good intentions? How do I get rid of faded memories?  How do I toss things out, knowing I would have to re-buy the same thing if I needed it, when we don't have ANY disposable income?

I am determined to figure this out. Determined to be happy with less stuff suffocating me.

How do you deal with your stuff?

One tiny potato

I'm beyond bummed. I have loved and nutured my potato plants these past several months. I watched as one of the plants flowered then died. I waited. Today I decided it was the right day to move away some of the pine needles and find my potatoes. I slowly pulled back the mulch a little. Then a little more. I didn't see any signs of potatoes. I dug a little faster, until I reached the bottom of the mound. There, all the way at the bottom I found one teeny tiny potato about the size of a ping pong ball...and a ton of slugs having some sort of orgy. Eew. I was devistated. MONTHS spent growing these and this was the big harvest. Damn.
Although I was pretty disappointed I decided I would just re-plant the tater tot in the main bed. It's either going to grow or compost in there, either of which are fine with me.

Summer

Summer is in full swing here in St Pete, FL.  They nights are hot and the days are hotter.  We've only had one or two days of rain in the past 5 months.  The garden is definitely taking a hit.  I can't seem to water enough to keep the soil moist.  The plants shrivel up and die.  I got 3 or 4 bean pods off of my black eyed pea plants before they gave up and died.  Harvests are few and far between, with the few foods I am getting not worth weighing or taking pictures of.  (Really, who wants to see a picture of a TINY strawberry and one cherry tomato?!?!)  This is the time of year I get really discouraged and throw in the towel.  I've decided that instead of focusing on what I can and can't grow right now I am going to primarily focus on improving my soil.

There is always compost to improve soil...and with my compost tumbler I'm hoping to pump out barrel after barrel of rich compost.  I'm also looking into trench composting, biochar, hugelkultur, and vermicomposting.  Even if I had all of these practices in place I imagine it would be a long process to get the garden beds amended enough to provide that beautiful hummus I desire.  Still, ya gotta start somewhere, right?

I hesitate to buy compost because I have been told by the master gardeners in Pinellas County that in order for compost to be effective it must be alive, and bagged compost is dead.  Besides, I'd prefer to make my own compost to know exactly what goes into it.  I'm also looking forward to switching from "affordable" seeds (aka: CHEAP & CRAPPY) to good quality, non-gmo heirloom seeds.  I have all my heirlooms on hand already and can't wait to switch when planting starts up again!

I really want to get moving on creating a community food forest in the front yard!  I've got 1660 sq feet of plantable land out front (that doesn't even include the 5' utility area by the street) and just don't know where to start!  Of course I realize I need to start building my soil out front also, but that's harder said than done.  I've planted a Moringa tree out front and can't decide if I want to pull out the oak tree before it gets big to make space for an edible tree.  (There's a family down the street from me that sells Mango trees and I think I'd like to swap the oak for a mango.)  Ideally I would be able to get the community involved in creating this space because I have no idea how I'd get it done all by myself.   Then I have to think of a name for the community garden.  I'm not great at coming up with happy, clever names for things.  If anyone in St Pete is interested in helping create, establish and maintain a community food forest please let me know!  I'm grateful for any help I can get!

Updates from the homestead

I've been slacking a bit on updating, so I'm going to cram everything into this post.

We have harvested 3 - 6 blueberries daily for the last couple weeks.  Nothing to write home about, but they are so sweet and delicious we eat them as we pick them!  We have also harvested about 6 little strawberries.  They are also sweet and delicious!  Tons of peppers coming out of the garden.  A few zucchinis too.  Tomatoes are starting to ripen so we've picked several cherry tomatoes and are seeing the first signs of red tomatoes on our heirloom plants.  Can't wait to start picking those...probably later this week.

We finally got chickens!  My awesome aunt ordered pullets and gave us 3 of them!  I've been wanting chickens for a long time now, but was hesitant because I am not really an animal lover so I didn't want them in the house...and was afraid I'd kill them (not on purpose of course!).  Once the chicks came home with us (April 18, 2012) we had the big task of constructing a coop ahead of us.  I'm VERY frugal and priced some supplies at home depot and realized this was going to cost us a small fortune.  I could have bought an already built coop for a few hundred dollars, but I was not about to spend that kind of money on these chickens.  I started searching Craigslist, knowing I had about 5 or 6 weeks before we had to have the coop built.  After a couple days I came across a family a few blocks away selling a pretty raggedy coop for $40!  I immediately told them I wanted it, sight unseen, and made pick up arrangements.  There was a lot of rotting/unusable wood that came with the coop, but it also came with 6 foot high chicken wire...about 20 feet of it, (4) 12 foot tin roof panels, lots of hardware (screws, bolts, wire, door hardware, etc) and quite a bit of usable wood!  We ended up needing to buy 2 more 2x4's (on sale for $3.50 each), 30 self tapping roofing screws, 2 more hinges (for a total cost of $16) and one roll of 3'x10' chicken wire for $11.  Total investment for our coop was $74!  And it will last for YEARS!  (As an added bonus, if we ever stop keeping chickens it will make a great extra storage area for tools, grills, etc.)  I've included a picture of our finished coop below.  (We have a huge dog crate on top of the table shown in the picture to put the girls up in the evenings.)

Our first cuke.  Didn't taste right though.  Matter of fact, ALL the cukes tasted bad.  I pulled all the plants.

2+ lb Kohlrabi!  There was a lot of tough fiber in it. Next time I'll cut it much sooner.

Almost 1 lb of swiss chard! 

Another big zucchini.  This one had a little worm in it that we cut away.

Green tomatoes that fell off when the pot blew over, pinto beans, blueberries, cherry tomatoes, and a jalapeno

More zucchini, blueberries and 2 pea pods (the only 2 that grew before the plants died.

Our $74 chicken coop!

The girls.  (Left to right: Blue, Rooster, Ming Ming)

Seed Saving...so easy a 2 year old can do it!

Cherry tomatoes, strawberries, blueberries, jalapeno and ghost peppers.

My First Zucchini

I've been trying to grow zucchini for years now and have never had any luck.  Today I finally got to harvest my first zucchini!  I had plans away from home yesterday so I didn't get to pick it, and it doubled in size overnight!  Amazing!  1 lb 0.4 oz.

One Step Forward and Two Steps Back

I swear sometimes it feels like I take one step forward and two steps back.  After all of the work I've done amending my garden beds with organic matter it seems I've got a few problems.

In the scattered seed area of the garden NOTHING seems to be growing.  First I was loosing all my seedlings to cutworms.  I tried the collar thing, which was only successful on one of my plants.  I've been out early in the morning to look for the darn cutworms, but have had little success.  I know, I know.  I'm supposed to look for them in the dark, but being a stay at home mom I am responsible for running the household so creeping around in the garden with a flashlight at night isn't in the cards for me right now.  The evening is when I am busiest with dinner, baths, cleaning up and feeding my husband who doesn't get off work until 8:00 pm.  I finally gave up on fighting cutworms only to have all my little bean plants die.  (You can see a picture of the beans if you scroll down on THIS PAGE.)  I reluctantly pulled up the beans only to find a million knots on the roots.

Yep...Root Knot Nematodes!

Talk about being discouraged.  I try to do everything right, but I swear Mother Nature doesn't want me to succeed.  It's frustrating.  I want to stomp my feet and scream.  But I don't'...often.

In one of the two areas I amended with organic miracle-gro all my plants were stunted and yellow.  I've watered (and watered and watered) to drain out the over fertilization.  I've dug up and transplanted many plants.  Finally things seem to be getting better in that area.  Whew!

After beating myself up for not being able to control these things I decided the best thing to do is to keep moving forward.  After all, how can things get better if I give up?  Last night I made a bunch of seedling pots using The Flyer and a shot glass.  And today I made a bunch of seed starting containers using things I had lying around (half a Dr Pepper box, cardboard milk container, plastic water jug, toilet paper rolls and a shoe box).  I took my tot outside and we planted seeds of Gourmet Blend Eggplant, Okra, New Zealand Spinach, Borage, Boc Choi, Black Eye Peas, Green Beans, Cantaloupe and Golden Amaranth.  I have my fingers crossed that they actually grow and produce.  I over planted to make up for the cutworms and nematodes.  It's best this way.  Better to have too many plants than not enough.  I know it's not really the right time to plant all of these seeds, but at this point I'll just be happy to see something growing.

Last week I planted carrots, boc choi, okra, artichoke and lettuce in containers.  The lettuce is sprouting nicely in the shade.  No activity from any of the other seeds yet.

The chicks should be here this weekend.  Sigh...I'm not prepared for them.  I have a container, litter, food, waterer, feeder...but no heat lamp and no coop (although I do have a huge dog crate I'll be using I haven't enclosed it or set it up yet).  I do have a work light out in the shed.  I also have a lamp in the closet I'm not using.  One may have to do for now.  I'm afraid if I don't get the right light I will end up killing them.  Heck, I'm afraid I'll end up killing them even if I do get the right light.  Dealing with dead chicks is not something I'm looking forward to.  Maybe, just maybe, since I've managed to keep my kids alive this long I'll be able to keep these chicks alive too.  Lol!  (That was totally a joke, by the way.)

A Walk Through The Garden

Finding lots of these little caterpillars on my tomato plants.

Caterpillar damage to tomato plants

More caterpillar damage to tomato plants

Heirloom Bush Tomatoes fruiting

Heirloom Tigress tomatoes fruiting

3 oz of fresh green beans.  Cooked them up and they were SWEET and DELICIOUS!

Ghost Pepper and Jalapeno Pepper harvest

Found what I thought were tiny white beetles on many plants.  Turns out they are Aphid Mummies!  Yay!

Bibb Lettuce going to seed

Tall Bibb lettuce plants going to seed

First strawberry flower!

Another picture of Aphid Mummies

Peppers we gave to a friend

Lettuce seeds getting close to harvest

Tomato plant tucked under a christmas palm doing well. 

Head of Bibb Lettuce

Broccoli flowering

Chocolate Mint and Papaya(?) rooting and taking off

The most successful of the MANY cabbage seeds I planted

Tiny cucumber

2nd tiny cucumber

The onions in the right bed growing like crazy!

Variegated Nastrum  

Not everything in the garden goes as planned or hoped for.  This is one sad looking green bean plant. 

Green bean plant with a couple carrot sprouts around it.

Potatoes in the ground doing well.

Potatoes in the container doing better than in ground.

Flowers (marigold and dwarf zinnea) with Seminole Pumpkin and Butternut Squash.

Basil is growing well, but other herbs look pretty sad.

Swiss Chard

Ghost and Jalapeno Pepper plants.

Golden Amaranth FINALLY sprouting.

Possible Borage sprout?  Maybe it's a weed.  Too early to know.

New Zealand Spinach finally sprouting.

Blueberry bushes, Japanese Cucumbers and 2 heirloom tomatoes waiting for their spots in the garden.

Blueberries!

Best looking zucchini plant with it's first female flower.

Random shot of the garden.  Cukes, squashes, onions, cabbage, corn and broccoli can be seen here.

The left side of the garden (herbs, beans, squashes, tomatoes and watermelon)  all doing well.  You can see my little helper was with me this morning.

Topsy Turvy Tomatoes doing well.

Huge Cauliflower and Lettuce plants (they stand about 4' tall!)

Strawberries

Kohlrabi and herbs 

Herbs next to Kohlrabi (Dill, Chives, Basil, Parsley in ground, Apple Mint and a small tomato plant in pot).