HomeGrownVegetables

Wow! , I can’t believe it’s May already, we have been too busy around here.  With so much to do I have neglected updates to the blog, I hope you can forgive me?!  Lemme run down a few things that have gone on since last we spoke.

We have had another dairy calf born, SweetLily is her name!

Newest Calf At The Farm

We had a litter of pigs born, as well as picked up a Large Black Boar to breed back to the mama pig.

Fightin' for the milk

Large Black Hog

Ok Ok enough of the farm animals, if you want more check out my other blog here!  Now on to the veggies!

After the tillage and bed preps , using the Earthway Seeder , I planted a large section of purple hull peas and they are coming along really nice.

Purple Hull Peas

The Earthway seeder is nice, but it does take a bit of adjustment to get it working at it best, and I’m still learning the ins and outs of it!

We also planted around 20 or so tomato plants, mostly Celebrity, a few Arkansas Travelers, and three Yellow Pear… If you haven’t tried these little wonders, I highly recommend them , sweet and delicious with just a hint on acidity….ummmm ummmm love em!

Celebrity Tomato Plant

It was getting late so i couldn’t get a good picture of the whole bunch of em , next post maybe!

Carrot Bunch

Pulled up a few carrots that we planted late fall last year, My wife loves em, I’m not a raw carrot person, but we did slice up a few and drop em in a jar of pickled Jalapenos… now that’s a treat!

We also have the cucumbers out and ready to run up the trellises , also the  zucchini and yellow summer squash is in the ground and growing along with some purple potatoes and Yukon Golds.

Got some corn planted too, but again the Earthway Seeder was hit or miss, along with the fact that my step-daughter was helping me…  Thanks Julie  hehehehe

oh tea, and I’m trying some Diakon Radish to make into some Kimchi later!  I’ll let you know how that goes too.

So that’s the update for now, I’ll keep ya posted…stay tuned!

I picked one of these up at our local feed store the other day and I thought I would share the experience with ya’ll.

Assembly

It was pretty easy to put this together, it involved about 4 bolts with nuts,  a pin and a few wing nuts, I had it together in about ten minutes, and that included finding the tools.

Tools And Seed Plates

Here you can see the tools needed to put the seeder together, 1/2 inch and 7/16 inch wrench and a cresent wrench, thats it, very simple !  The seed plates in the picture are different sizes to plant the different seeds, there are 6 altogether , you can also purchase other sized seed plate to handle any possible seed you could want.

Still In The Box

Here is the box, to give you an idea of the size, 4 cubic ft bag of humus for reference!

Assembling The Seeder

The seeder comes partly assembled in the box, all you have to put on is the rear wheel, the handle and the row spacer, in the photo above I have the wheel on and I’m about to add the handle, you can see that in the left side of the photo.

The handle goes on with 4 nuts and bolts , its that easy , the row marker goes on with a pin and cotter key so it can move freely, very simple design.  Like I said it took maybe ten minutes total.

Complete Earthway Seeder

There is also a black plastic clip that the row marker folds up and tucks out of the way in, it just clips on the the handle , it doesn’t hold the marker very well at all, you may have to rig something if you want it to stay there when your done seeding.

Well there you have it , in ten minutes a time and back saving device for the serious gardener, next time a review of the seeder in action, and yes it does have some pros and cons, but i’ll let you know about ‘em soon, so stay tuned!

Spring Is Here

Well the last few weeks have been real busy around here, we have had some of the best weather you could ask for!  As you can see  spring has come in Southeast Texas, just look at all the green out there, just a few weeks ago it was dry, brown and really crispy.

During the last weeks we have moved the cows to another pasture, set up some fence and are in the process of building a loading pen.  We also have tilled up a large chunk of the front pasture to plant some purple hull peas, but i’ll keep ya posted on that one!

Veggies

Some of the veggies we had planted in the fall didn’t really do much thanks to our record snow fall over the winter, but now with the balmy temps around here, everything is puttin on the growth!

Swiss Chard

Carrots

The chard and carrots are really moving now, but my favorite , the asparagus is really rolling!!

Asparagus Bed

Asparagus Up Close

If you sit still and watch you can almost see the asparagus grow, they move quick!

More About the Peas!

I tilled up a pretty good plot that we are going to try some purple hull peas in this yea, and if they don’t work out , at least i’ll have a whole lot of green manure to use next year!  So I will keep ya’ll updated on that>

So until next time, grow some food will ya!!??

After several years of hand working gardens, tending milk cows and goats, raising a few pigs we finally decided to get a tractor.  After several weeks of shopping we finally came across Calvin at Allied Power Mart , he made us a deal and we took it.

We got a used rental tractor, Kubota L5740 with 178 hours,Front end loader,  a round bale spear, and a 60 inch tiller for a real good deal, they even delivered it to us, They are a real class act there at allied… and no this isn’t a paid endorsement.

Delivery Day

We didn’t wait long to try it out, we hooked up the tiller and started in on a 40 x40 foot plot that has sort of grown over, lemme tell you , it cut thru the overgrown weeds like butter, what would have take a whole day with a walk behind tiller took about 15 minutes, and that was with my brother-in-law and me taking turns on it and marveling at our achievements, Here take a look!

Tilling the garden plot

Like i said it chopped thru weeds and soil and left a smooth patch of dirt, you could hardly see any vegetable matter left.

60 inch tiller

You can see on the right side what the patch looked like prior to the tilling, and the results on the left side after just one pass, its smooth.

Before the tilling

Here is a better shot, you can still see the rows in the bottom right, that’s from previous cropping, it flattened those out too.

After 2 passes, here it is

As you can see it does a very thorough job smoothing out this plot, i’ll be planting as soon as the last frost date comes up in a few weeks!

Well thanks for checking by again, I’ll keep you updated on the planting soon!

Ok folks, here it is, my homemade seed starting rack!   I’m going to use this to  get a little head start on my vegetable seeds this year. I tried to start some last year but it just wasn’t enough light is the house with out some serious lighting backup.  I think I have that problem solved this year, take a look.

The Parts

Wire baking Rack

We had this one already, They run about $40 at the Sam’s club, the good part about these is that the shelves are adjustable. There is also a larger rack that runs about $90 , if you need more capacity.

Fluorescent Shop Lights

I got these two shop light fixtures at home depot for $9 apiece, The rack has a total of 4 shelves so if you wanted to you could add four more lights for a total of three actual growing shelves, but for know I’m starting with one.

Rigging The Lights

The set up is pretty easy, the lights have some chain included with the, you just have to get the lights centered like you like them and hook the chain to the fixture and then the shelf.  I used two fixtures for the shelf for more light, but you could use just one fixture per shelf need be.  Once the lights are connected you’ll need to adjust the shelves so there is very little clearance from the top of your seed pots and the light base, you’ll need to adjust the light distance as the plants grow, but the closer the better, this keeps the plants from getting too leggy.

Final Configuration

Well here she is, for about 15 minutes of work and around $70 I put this lighted seed starting rack together, it should last a long time since it will be indoors for most of its useful life. I have a few flats of seeds ready to go, so that will be another post, I don’t have the photos ready yet hehehe.

If you needed to you could rig the shelf unit with some sheet plastic for a mini green house set up, I used this set up since it will be in the house where the temps are good but the light isn’t.

Well thats it, I’ll keep you updated on how it works, I potted up some roma tomatoes and some  Jalepeno and sweet banana pepper seeds for the first batch and we’ll see how they work!

Good luck with your gardening!!

Some Ideas For Your Spring Garden Preparations.

Here in my zone, it won’t be long until the cold weather goes away for a while, and will be replaced with the scorching temps that Southeast Texas is known for. In between those two extremes is the three week period known as Spring, when fair weather and sunshine prevail.

Until then the time is nye to make the preps for the long gardening season ahead. So here are some ideas to get you jump started.  Oh and If your are still under the 6 week sentence of  Punxsutawny Phil, adjust you times accordingly.

1. Order Some Seeds!

Get your seed catalogs out and order your new crops, get the beans, get the lettuce, get the melons , just get something! Also make sure you get the right crops for the right season!  There is no way I can grow lettuce  anytime after June in my area, its just way to hot.

2. Prepare the Planting Beds.

No matter if you till , or follow the no till, lasagna methods of bed prep, now is the time to start. I have loads of unraked leaves that haven’t made it to the compost pile yet, If you till, now is the time to work them in to the soil, They need time to break down properly.

Set up some raised beds, I have used concrete blocks landscape timbers, old tires, the possibilities are endless.  Also set up any fencing to keep the pests and varmints out! Bird netting too, don’t forget the bird netting! Its a life saver.

3. Start Some Seeds!

When the seeds you ordered come in, or the seeds you saved from last years garden, you did save some seeds didn’t you? You’ll need to start the seeds. Some plants do better being direct seeded, others do better with a head start, tomatoes are one example.

You can use the “Mini-Greenhouse”  kits you get at the box stores, or if you have a florescent light , and some space you can make a better homemade set up…Look for my post on this coming soon!  Anyway, use some loose seed starting soil and get to it, In five to fifteen days the seeds will begin to sprout, keep the grow light close to the seedlings so they don’t get to leggy!

Before you plant the seedlings, let them acclimate outside for a few days, wait till the weather will cooperate, this will keep the new tender plants from getting “weather shock”.

Well I hope these ideas get you started on the way to a great garden this year, lemme know what you get planted when the time comes, I’ll keep ya’ll up to date too!

And as always , thanks for stopping by!

We have had some pretty cool temps around here for the last month, also alot of rain too. Everything is one big, cold, mud puddle so doing anything around the garden has been difficult.  Today it warmed up to around 50 and the sun was out so I decided to dig up the Horseradish , which is better after a frost, we have had at least six in the last 2 weeks. I will grate this up later when I get a chance , I just wanted to get it out of the ground today since it was so nice outside. So without further delay here are the pixs!

Horseradish Ready for Harvest

Here is the plant about to be dug out, it looks pretty big from the top.

Horseradish Dug Up

Here I have chopped the tops off and dug it out, it was down pretty deep, there are alot of side shoots which will start new plants. I have to tell you that as I’m digging this out the smell is awesome, like really sweet horseradish sauce!

Horseradish Cleaned

Here I have hosed off most of the dirt and it looks good, there is one main root and a pretty good side root, I’ll grate this up later tonight and let you Know how it turns out!

And Have a good New Year BTW!!

I know I said in a previous post that we get the mild winters, well every now and then Mother Nature pulls a fast one. Friday afternoon, it started snowing here , not a blizzard mind you but snow.  This was the earliest recorded snowfall in our area since they started recording stuff like this. It was quite a shocker!!  The Friday evening the clouds and snow cleared off and the temps began to plummet, when I woke up Saturday it was 23 degrees , unheard of around here at this time of year, and oh the frost we saw!!

Frosty

Yep , I put it off until it was almost too late. i made a mad dash Friday afternoon to spread some hay around the garden in hopes that everything won’t be frozen solid, let’s hope it worked.

Frost in the back pasture

The shadow of the house and the frost that follows it.

This shot is of the shadow of the house and the frost like, the sun melts it so fast .

More frost out back

Yep, so forget all I said about mild winters here, let me rephrase that and say, Unpredictable Winters hahahahaha!

I’ll keep you posted on any plant damage in the future, too early to tell yet.

So until next time , stay warm!!!

When it’s 54 degrees outside and a slight drizzles is coming down, there ain’t much you can do outside in the garden, so let’s bring it inside for a while and look over a few of the seed catalogs that fill up the mail box over the year!

Johnny’s Select Seeds

Johnny’s has one of the best put together catalogs in the business , IMHO.  It’s full color and brimming with pix, and every description lays out the info you’ll need to make the most out of your crop.   The tools section has more goodies than you could find just about anywhere, hoes, seeders, what ever you need.  So when the December Gloom is in yo face, check this catalog out!

Seed Savers Exchange

If rare and heirloom varieties are you thing, Seed Savers is the place for you!  This catalog is not as polished as Johnny’s, but what it lacks in shine it makes up for in variety.  I didn’t even know there were that many different kinds of beans!!    The layout is easy to navigate  and it still has plenty of pix and info for the avid gardener, it also has an extensive book section in the back.  Overall a great catalog!

Henry Field’s

Henry Field’s catalog is another great one, It has a great selection of seeds but also has an extensive fruit and nut tree section.  This one has plenty of full color photos and information and a large tool and goody section as well.  It’s another good one to pull you through the cold times.

And for all the flower people out there each of the catalogs mentioned above have a large flower seed section as well, so there is something for everyone

I know there are plenty more , these are just a few that I have done business with, and no I’m not on the payroll of any of them.

So enjoy your shopping and I hope you can make it through until Spring!

Happy Gardening!

The last three tomatoes of the season have turned red, and we’ll miss the great taste of a red, vine ripe summer tomato, oh well only 5 months till spring!

Now to clean out this area for the next round, or maybe I’ll let this bed sit for a while with a thick layer of compost.

First Sprouts Of The Fall/Winter Garden

So thanks to the extra mild temps we have had these last couple weeks, most of the stuff we direct seeded into the raised beds has started to sprout!

We seeded:

• Cauliflower
• Broccoli
• Brussels Sprouts
• Oriental Cabbage
• Regular Cabbage
• Carrots
• Red and Yellow  Onions
• Soft Neck Garlic
• Beets
• Radishes

I’m trying to figure out my macro settings on the camera , so maybe soon I can get some better pics for ya’ll.

Until then Enjoy the Fall weather, it’s awesome!!!