plans for 2007

not even finished with the gardening season of 2007. And now, I'm making plans for 2007.

The main idea is that we're going to reconcieve the vertical bed as a "modified raised bed" and not a "square foot bed"-- the difference is that I've now realized after a couple of years that although my zig-zag design looked cool on paper, it has unanticpated problems-- that major one is that its very tough to get into the middle of the beds to go after stray vines.

I think what we'll do is only raise the verticals on one side (say, the side opposite the house). Modify the planting so the spacing is 12x24.

Or...

An alternate plan would be to plant the climbers on one side of the bed. use non vining crops in the other side of the bed-- still sticking to the sqaure foot plan. We could also use one 4 foot row from one of the boxes. I noticed that this year we only used about 24 of 32 spaces.

In any case, half of the vertical trellises won't be used.

Also, we will order new seed for 2006-- its been a few years. I really want to grow Creole (nod to Louisiana), Brandywine (Sudduth's strain), Hillbilly, and Cherokee Purple next year.

Still want to plant at least one paste/roma type as well (read about a flavorful market variety called Classica at tomatogrowers.com).
I'd like to try another cherry/grape tomato instead of reisenstrabe.

A couple of tried and true hybrids for productivity.

I'd like to have a very early tomato (Early Girl, or Stupice or maybe a hybrid for cool climates-- i read about tomatoes bred for alaska!).
my idea is to plant one of these Early Tomatoes around april 15th and sheild it in case of frost. And then, plant another Early Tomato on July 15-- so it produces through until frost.

i guess that's 7 varieties... might need to pare that down.

We will order my jimmy nardello pepper seed and maybe look for another interesting pepper. The rest we can get at the nursery.

Also-- shaker yard long beans for next year! And all the usual types.

review of Jim's tomatoes

I'm growing 4 hybrids and 1 heirloom at home. The most productive seem to be a tie between Mr. Stripey and Lemon Boy. After that, better boy.

Pink beefsteak is producing intensely flavored tomatoes-- the best of the bunch. According to my literature, it should have been the size winner and late season. Ironically, it was the first to ripen and the sizes have been about the same as better boy, if not smaller. But I was hoping for the later season on it, because everything is ripening at once-- it was supposed to be 10-20 days later than the rest.

Mr. Stripey hasn't resulted in a striped yellow/orange. Its a solid yellow with faintly orange streak. I was looking for the novelty factor. Nothingl like its picture Oh well. its a big, productive plant. The flavor is good but mild.

The least distinguished of my tomatoes from home is Bonnies Best. The tomatoes don't distinguish much from Better Boy. The plant is less productive. I won't really bother with this one again.

I expect the tomatoes at the honors garden to start producing in two weeks, since we set them out so late this season.

the heat is on (but almost over)

weather.com has a nice table chart of averages for just about every location in the USA. I was looking at the average high temps for 41099. It would be easier to visualize with graph showing the day by day average highs and lows.

in any case, the temperatures peak in the 87 to 88 degree average from July 5th to August 12. The average high temperatures begin to fall after that point.

So, in theory, we're almost through the thick of it. The average high returns to the lovely 70's about September 14.

I stopped back up at the garden to go over the areas we cut once more with the mower. I figured with the first cutting happening once the grass was about 6 inches long, we'd have a cleaner cut if it happened the next day. I cut some diseased tomato vines and trained many more vines up the trellises.

reel lawnmower

Aaron and I put together our new reel lawn mower on Saturday.

My father had told me several times that reel lawnmowers were heavy, awful things that did a terrible job of cutting the lawn compared to a power mower.

However, we are only responsible for cutting around the gardens where the NKU Groundscrew lawnmowers can't reach. Its about 400 sq ft, max. So it seemed crazy to pay $200 for a modest power mower. So when researching reel mowers, I found out that although the design of the mowers haven't changed much since the were invented in the 19th century, the materials have changed considerably-- making them much lighter and easier to use. The biggest difference is that reel mowing should be down more often than conventional power mowers because the blade will roll over long gras rather than cut it.

So we plopped down $90 and both took turns mowing. It felt like a moment out of Tom Sawyer when the neighborhood boys paid to whitewash the house. It was fun! It was quiet!

I think that we should be cutting grass weekly from now to november. I can take weekends.

We fixed our sagging vertical trellises, trained vine up and watered. Aaron pointed out that the pasilla peper plants never flowered. Looks like mule seed. We harvested tons of cucumber and peppers-- a few jimmy nardellos and lots of banana pepper.

On our to-do list is giving the garden a dose of fish emulsion and keeping up the watering schedule.