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The Houston Chronicle Declares the End of Winter!

February 1, 2012

Bishop Gardening, Spring, Vegetables , , , 6 Comments

Several times in my recent postings I have mentioned how mild this so called winter has been. Well, this past weekend the Houston Chronicle declared that winter is over! Just to cover their” paper derriere” they mentioned that February sometimes surprises us and that the official average last day of frost at Bush Intercontinental Airport is March 1st. I have been making my own observations on how the various plants in both my backyard farm and in the area have been responding. The results are mixed but the plant world seems to think that Spring is here!

Evidence that spring is here and winter (the winter that never was) has faded away include these observations;

  • The Ornamental pear trees have been in full blossom for over a week now
  • My strawberries are blooming like crazy –
  • I noticed plum and peach trees on sale at the nursery were blooming last week – Late January!
  • My potted pepper plants are still green and one has two bell peppers nearly ready to pick.
  • My overwintered upside down tomato plant is leafing out!

And low and behold,during  this morning’s walk through my garden I spotted an asparagus spear emerging up through the layers of leaf mulch!

My Meyer Lemon tree seems to be a little more reluctant to believe what is written in the paper. I looked closely at the tree this morning and although there is a  bit of evidence of bud formation, they are probably a week or two away from bursting open. It is not unusual for  lemon trees to blossom in February but today is just the first day of the month.

I need to get over to John’s garden today and thin the lettuce patch. I scattered about 4 different varieties in his bed and they found a home very much to their liking. They are thick, crowded and the thinning’s should be a nice addition to a garden salad. I will probably need to help his sugar snap peas continue their upward climb…. they seem to like his bed a little better than mine do…… I still get a few to eat from my yard but John should have many handfuls of the sweet green pods gracing his table soon!

I am being tempted………. not by whiskey ( well maybe a little) or younger women (hmmmmmm…..) insert a smile here as I pause to think…….Okay….I am tempted by many things but today the temptation at hand is about tomatoes!!!!! I want them and I want them early – before the brutal Houston heat sets in for the summer! I will wander down to Kingwood Nursery this week and see if the temptation will be realized… they carry both hybrids and heirlooms that do well in the local area…. If I get an early start and make provisions to shield the plants if, as the Chronicle noted, February surprises us…. I can be eating home grown tomatoes by the end of April – WOW!

TTFN

Bishop

PS – I have some 20 year old Pappy Van Winkle Whiskey and may be able to get my hands on the 23 year old this week – the whiskey!

New Year’s Garden – Much Better Than a Hangover

January 3, 2012

Bishop Composting, Gardening, mulching , , , 1 Comment

My New Year’s Eve celebration was limited to a couple of Samuel Adams Winter Lagers, I just love the shape of the glass – the beer is pretty good too- while waiting in the airport in sunny Florida. I was lucky enough to be with my best friend, my wife Kathy and our “favorite” youngest child Joe.  I dozed off on the flight back to Houston dreaming of getting my hands back into the dirt in my little backyard garden. I was planning the work needed to prepare for spring……and the crazy thing is, our spring weather may start at any time during January! This morning though, it was a bit brisk  35 F, about 2 C for you folks on the other scale….so I wore a sweater with my short pants and to the horror of my children – socks with my sandals!

Yesterday was the 2nd day of the new year and a warmer than this morning. I knocked a few things off of my to-do-list. I have been anxiously waiting for the asparagus ferns to die…..they didn’t cooperate so I wacked them off – to my Australian friends, Geoff, Charles and Alan…do not manipulate the word wack….I know what is running through your brains, so, stop it right now! – back to the asparagus…I then top dressed with some good aged compost from my bins….2011 vintage, and then added a 3-4 inch layer of leaves to help smother the weeds- those nasty little buggers that can take over the bed if not managed.

I finally got around to removing the green bean vines and poles. It took just a few minutes and I don’t know why I waited so long….maybe it has to do with my usual tendency for procrastination ….as I wrote those few previous words I felt a little guilty because – here  I am, sitting on a half-finished project for a “paying” client and I am filling my free time with random & rambling thoughts. The paycheck for the real work is 60 days or more out into the future and the “fun” I have writing is my  immediate gratifcation…….I think I am contradicting some of the advice I have given my children…I have told them to work hard and not focus on the “instant gratification” sought out by so many!!!!! Sorry kids, you need to get a little instant gratification every now and then…it helps you smile! Dad also says…….don’t over do it!

Oh yes, the beans….. That bed, a 4X25 foott bed, is now sitting mostly idle as it is shaded most of the day. I had overseeded it with buckwheat in the early fall as a green manure. This bed is loaded with earthworms……to the delight of my 16 year son, who is a fishing fool! Fortunately he doesn’t fish day and night which could wreak havoc on the worm population! The winter solstice has come and gone allowing the shade to begin  creeping southward to start warming up the entire garden area. I also managed a quick courtesy call to John’s garden beds, I  watered, weeded and added some compost to the original bed. John, FYI – turnips and radishes are already up!

The photo below right  shows a good portion of my main garden beds. Unseen in this photo are two , 4X8 foot beds behind me, one of which has the asparagus and just beyond the fence along the back fence is a bed with 75+ strawberry plants….all ground level so the slugs and rollie-pollies can have a tasty snack in the spring. It really is a competition between me and the bugs to save the berries….chemicals would kill the critters but they would also find their way into my strawberry jam…I can’t have that, so, I am willing to share a little. You can just make out the edge of my compost bins to the left, also on the left are the strawberry towers, some blackberry vines, a potting table at the far end, a bit of storage to the right and lots of bare spots waiting for more seeds and warmth. The left photo shows a bit of what lies outside the gate to my dirt paradise. On the right side is one end of the ground level strawberries against my back fence. For some reason Sam Adams wanted a little more exposure so it is at the bottom of the post…..(I couldn’t figure out how to remove it without buggering up the post)  TTFN – Bishop

John Doubles Down

December 26, 2011

Bishop Fall, Gardening, Vegetables , , Leave a comment

The New and the Old......side by side.

Christmas Eve santa wandered into John’s backyard and doubled his garden space…..Cold and rainy evening but Santa wandered off to his appointed rounds a little damper but also feeling pretty smug about the clandestine delivery. The seeds and bulbs would have to wait….too many stockings to fill, cookies to eat and glasses of milk to drink!

On Christmas Day Santa showed back up at John’s house in his everyday Bishop Decker, friend and neighbor, disguise to plant a few seeds and tuck away some left over onion and garlic bulbs….. not too sure about the timing for the bulbs but it is better than letting them wither away. I suspect that the mild “winter” we are in the midst of may work in our favor. I planted some lettuce and carrots in a surprise pattern. So what is a surprise pattern????? I mix about 4 – 5 varieties in my little seed spreader, shake them up and scatter across the designated area. I recently used the technique in my beds and I see lots of seedlings popping up…..too early to see which varieties. I plan to thin them after they are well established and should have a smorgasbord of lettuce and carrots to pick. I added some radish seeds, beets & turnips to his winter bed. It should be fun to see what he does with the harvest!

My last-minute gardening efforts before heading off to Orlando for my son Joe’s soccer tournament included adding a spring to my gate to aid in “self” closing and a support cable to the gate doesn’t sag so much. Looks good and closes so smooooothly! While out in the garden this morning I was able to snack on the so very sweet sugar snap peas…..yum! My asparagus ferns are nearly ready to cut back so they will be very high on my to-do list when I/we return from Orlando. I will need to spend an hour or so with garden gnome tasks over at John’s yard…pulling weeds and laying down a layer of leaf mulch to suppress or at least slow the growth of the weeds. I gave him a book titled, “The Organic Kitchen Garden” book to stimulate his creative side…he really is an excellent cook –   the grin on his face as he was flipping through the pages warmed” ole” Santa’s heart!

The newly planted strawberries are “leafing” out – yee-haw!!!!!

Now off to pack my bags….

TTFN

Bishop

“Strawberry Towers Forever”

December 12, 2011

Bishop berrries, Composting, Fall, Gardening, mulching , , 1 Comment

Did I get the Beatles song wrong….. Strawberry Fields Forever? It just sounded like a good title and “towers” has such a nice ring to it.

I have been wanting to provide “all y’all” with an update on my strawberry towers experiment. It seems to be working pretty well…… even though I still think the 3 inch pipe is too small. The plants weathered the first freeze with no apparent injury. They are looking very healthy and I can’t wait until early spring when they begin to blossom.  The strawberry shown above was picked on February 14th, Valentines Day in 2010. It wasn’t until later, in fact someone sent me a note about the nearly perfect heart shape of the berry, that I noticed the shape. Too bad that I didn’t notice it when I took the picture because I could have said that I had planned it all along. I think it does pay to tell the truth…… that way you don’t have to remember what the lie was!!!!! Click photos fo a bigger image.

The towers seem to be supporting the growth of the transplants pretty well.  The receptacles at the top seem to work well for watering. Gravity takes over and down it flows. I had my good friend John swing by this past weekend and I showed him the experiment. I think he agrees with the idea of testing the 6″ set-up. I will use 6″ PVC drain pipe for phase two of the experiment. Over the Christmas break I will gather up the materials and put it into action. Photos to come.

John has a 4X4 bed that I put in his backyard 2 years ago that needs some attention. I told him that I would be over this next week and clean up the 2011 season remnants and install another 4×4 adjacent to the original. I know he wants one because he installed the irrigation piping to accommodate the expansion…..isn’t that right John? Seems like a good “how to” posting for a future blog. We have one significant challenge. John has his Golden Retriever “Pismo” hooked on vegetables, so much that she harvests ripe tomatoes for him. The next step in her training is to bring them up to the patio and leave them for the family. Unfortunately she loves homegrown tomatoes a bit too much!

My wife is out in California helping to manage some family issues. She saw the post on the turnips and wanted to know if I really ate them….Absolutely! I placed a nice pork loin in the crock pot with turnips, onion, garlic, potatoes and cabbage….wish my carrots were ready….that would have topped it off nicely……. So, yes hun, I ate them and they were excellent!

Plans for this week –

The fall leaves are falling….go figure! – I have to thank my mother for her help with my leaves and the leaves around the neighborhood. She “surprised” me with a nice machine to suck up and shred the leaves as well as chip branches up to about 1.5 inches in diameter.  Wow, mom I have to tell you, it works great. I have been able to deeply mulch one bed with shredded leaves and I have designs on several more. Any excess will find their way into my compost bins.

I fed the worms yesterday and I see  it is time to harvest their rich castings….now some people might refer to it as worm poop – castings sounds so much cleaner and more proper. I am continually amazed how well they do their work even when I don’t give them to attention that I should. Diligent critters they are!!!!

Seeds need to be planted……..More lettuce to replace what my son’s dog zeroed in on…..just doing what dogs do but she could have dug her holes somewhere else. More beets, more carrots, some spinach & chard, sugar snap peas, maybe some bok choy, turnips and a another row of radishes.

Six inch strawberry towers and find a source of winter strawberry plants to finish up the project.

Non-gardening……with my wife gone I have laundry, dishes to do, floors to mop, Christmas decorations to organize …… I am not sure how she finds time to do all that stuff. It kind of gets in the way of my gardening, wood-turning, fishing, bicycling, beer brewing/drinking and  coffee with my buddies down at Starbucks…….. in fact she contacted me at Starbucks this morning and cut my visit short……but hun, I am not complaining, wink,wink!

A note to Jane…..I loved the lemon curd you gave me a year ago and I have a bunch of Meyer Lemons ready to provide their juice for my curd making this week. I will see if I can work that in between some of my lingering tasks. Maybe I will wait until after the curd is done before mopping! John….I still think I can handle the expansion …….. what else can I defer???????

TTFN

Bishop

 

Learning Lessons and other Musings

November 20, 2011

Bishop Beans, berrries, Gardening, Vegetables , , , Leave a comment

Planted 3 Inch Strawberry Towers

Sugar Snap Peas climbing skyward

 The lesson from the experiment are many and a bit painful.

Lesson number one – 3 inch drain pipe is too small – I debated and again the cheap side of me went with the lower cost….guess what. Sometimes more is better …. (I chose the politically correct phrase). The 4 inch pipe is probably a good choice but the more I look at it and work with the 3 inch pipe the 6 inch may be the best choice.
Lesson number two – fill with the planting media as you plant.  I filled the 3 inch pipes to the top before the plants arrived and it becomes a challenge to get the plants well seated.
Lesson three – space the holes out in a less dense pattern.  I chose a 90  degree orientation with the back side blank. I read an article a couple of months ago where a young lad experimented with spacing solar cells based on plant world configurations – something like Fibonacci numbers –   and the results were amazing. So I may play around with real plant world arrangements like – 135° (or 3/8) : eight leaves in three gyres. The Fibonacci sequence would predict 137.5 degrees as an optimum spacing. That would be 8 holes in three rows and then repeat.
Lesson 4 – the holes are probably the right size/diameter but the  forstner bit leaves a sharp edge in the hole. Have you heard the joke where the patient says to the doc, “It hurts when I put my finger into the holes in the pipe!” The doc  tells him, “The cure is to stop putting your finger in there!” I should have listened to the doc. I shredded the index finger on both hands – so the pain is evenly distributed. I think that helps?
I think I will experiment with the 6 inch pipe this coming spring – I will be”frugal” and rather than build the towers using PVC Tees and Ells, I will use a post hole digger to set the pipe upright. I figure 12-15 inches deep should be sufficient.
The warm weather is helping and hindering. The help – I am still picking green beans and cucumbers… as well as bell peppers, yellow banana peppers, serrano peppers and radishes. I picked all of my green tomatoesover a week ago thinking that November would bring some cool weather – well I should have waited.  Is it Global Warming or too “dadgum” politicians spewing hot air????? 82 degrees F today, 28 C for the rest of the world.
Now the bad. I am waiting for my asparagus ferns to respond to the cold, ha ha, and turn brown so I can cut them back. They are still green, still growing and sending up new shoots. So, …… ????????
I love puttering around in the garden an snacking on the fresh crunchy stuff. Fresh green beans today and a couple of sugar snap pea pods… not worth bringing into the house – just right for crunchy chewing in the garden.
TTFN
Bishop

Strawberry Towers Phase One

November 2, 2011

Bishop berrries, Composting, Gardening , , , , Leave a comment

I have decided to try going vertical with my soon to arrive strawberries.  I have seen a number of different approaches to going vertical and decided to build a two tower set-up as my first test. I chose 3″ PVC drain pipe – it is light weight, cheaper than the heavy wall PVC and easy to work with. The picture below shows the two tower set-up after they were put together and filled. The base of the structure is filled with pea gravel for stability. I drilled 24 –  1 1/4″ holes in each tower, none on the back side. I inserted a butcher paper tube inside prior to filling with potting soil. The blue masking tape is used to keep the tubes in place as I filled the pipe and to help keep the soil in place. When planting a small hole will be made through the paper and the bare root plant will be placed into the hole. I have subsequently added a 3X4 swage on top as an added reservoir for water and liquid nutients.

The Twin Strawberry Towers

I also drilled a weep hole a few inches above the “Tee” at the base of the tower. Wetting the soil by pouring water from the top was going very slowly. So when I returned from my inner injection appointment this afternoon I swung by Lowes and picked up a couple of 3X4 swages and placed them on top to increase the volume of water I can pour. Seems to be working much better. Have not yet filled the towers with enough water to  reach the weep holes. It may take a lot of water as the pore space in the base could be considerable.

During the construction of the  test towers it dawned on me that this could develop into a viable hydroponic set-up. The PVC piping used for the base could be used to provide the return run of the nutient run-off. Rather than using potting soil, a hydroponic perlite type of material could be used. While doing a little research into the hydroponic stuff I seem to run across lots of sites that are linked to growing that funny seven leafed plant that is in the news quite often. Wow – 55 gallon drums of nutient chemical will set you back about 3 grand….Must be good money in growing that other stuff……

The week of November 7th is the promised date for my strawberry plants to arrive. I have to work all week so planting will be deferred a bit. The plants should hold well in the produce drawer until the weekend.

Shown next is the close-up of the 1/8″ weep hole and another angle of the base and towers set up next to my compost bins and in front of my blackberry bed.  If the experiment works it could lead to a small commercial patch. I think you could increase plantings by a factor of 5 or 6 in the same square footage of space and really simplify the harvest. I have seen the strawberry harvest in California and it is back breaking, stoop labor. This could be a win all around. Intitial investment might be a little higher but in the long term could be much cheaper.

FYI – The towers are not glued in place to aid in dumping and replacing the growing medium. In the future I may consider 4″ or even 6″ PVC drain pipe.

Towers next to compost bins

1/8 " Weep hole

TTFN Folks

Bishop

Returning Home From Midland

October 30, 2011

Bishop Beans, berrries, Gardening, Vegetables , , , , , , , , , 1 Comment

The Right Side is the Sunnier Side
Left side gets winter shade.

I returned Friday morning from a week in Midland Texas. Kathy kept the thirsty guys and gals in the beds well watered. We finally got some rain Thursday – not nearly enough to put a dent into the drought but it was a good soaking rain. I used my iPhone to shoot the two pictures shown. Not bad for an early generation iPhone…. I havent upgraded yet.

At the entrance on the left side my “volunteer” cucumber plants have been rewarding me nicely. I picked two very nice cukes for my salads and another 6 or so are maturing nicely. The green beans are doing well and I gathered about 3 handfuls. As you can see on the front right… the sugar snap peas are just reaching up to grab the twine. The bush cucumbers, back right, are beginning to produce little cukes but the weather may not let them become full-sized. Also in the right side beds are some radishes – I picked a few yesterday to go with the salads.
The butter crunch lettuce doesn’t seem to want to germinate so I reseeded two rows Friday AM…. hopefully the cool temperatures will help out. The kale has really taken off and the white onion sets put out a week ago are reaching skyward. I need to share a few  sets with my buddy John this week along with some of the extra garlic.  I also transplanted some broccoli today. The plants looked really healthy and they should do well.
I should be getting my strawberry plants week after next. I have 150 coming. 48 of them will be used to fill my vertical PVC towers, 24 per tower.  I am anxious to see how well they do in the towers. I will feature the strawberry plantings in a future rambling.
I am still waiting to see if the tomatoes will break color before the temperatures put a halt to their ripening.  It will be sunny and slightly warmer for the next 7 days and beyond!!!! So, fingers crossed, I will get some home-grown fall tomatoes.
TTFN
Bishop

Before and After – Ready for the Fall Season

September 8, 2011

Bishop Beans, berrries, Gardening, mulching, Solarizing, Vegetables , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

Well it has been brutal working in the garden, adding the extra touches and prepping for my fall growing season. As always I will be experimenting a little – it is all about learning.

When we returned from vacation the gourds and the indeterminate tomatoes had gone wild. There was not a clear and easy path down through the middle of my two biggest beds. Then there was the ankle biting Bermuda grass. You know, Bermuda grass is not so bad when you want it for your lawn, but in a vegetable bed…. it is insidious! I had tried to mulch the Bermuda out but it is just amazing how it can find a little light and burst out. I promise, scouts honor, to not let it get ahead of me this year. Yes, I was a Boy Scout…..not like my nephews that made Eagle Scout – congratulations Wesley and Wade, but I did make about 12 merit badges.

I recently scared off a potential convert. I had been negotiating with my friend John to add a 4X4 bed to his existing 4X4 raised bed. Once he saw my jungle at the end of July and followed my efforts to reclaim/re-tame my plot he backed off. I think we can get him to do another 4X4 – walk before we run.

So, the experiments; I planted tomatoes in August in order to get another bountiful blessing before first frost. The Carmello variety is setting some nice big flowers that may bear fruit. The jury is out on the others. The pole beans are climbing like crazy so I am optimistic for them. The Serrano Pepper plant is loaded with blossoms – 100’s. They just need to set. After solarizing my problem bed for 5+ weeks, I pulled the plastic off a couple of days ago and have begun planting it. I am trying Bush Cucumbers, Swiss Chard (always does well), the first of some staggered lantings for my beet rows, sugar snap peas and I will get some carrots going this weekend. I will continue to stagger plant beets and carrots about every 3 weeks. I have a couple of recently planted squash plants that have not shown signs of distress so I am hopeful. Lettuce will come in another few weeks. I have 150 strawberry plants being shipped the first week of November. I had very few survive this brutal summer.

I also poured a walkway down through the middle of my large beds. I used one of those forms that looks like irregular stones .Kathy wondered why I was pouring during the 105 deg weather and not waiting until December. I didn’t have a good answer other than I just wanted to get it done!  I think it looks good and should keep the mud away…..if it ever rains again. We are over 20 inches behind.

Here is a link to a cool site for backyard farming;

http://www.homefarming.com/

Look for another installment in a couple of weeks.

TTFN

Bishop

April 20, 2011

Bishop berrries, Canning, Gardening, jam and jelly, Mason bees , , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

I think my wife really does love me. I was out of town on a job in the Midland and Lubbock areas of West Texas and unable to tend to my gardening chores. I flew home early last Saturday morning and she surprised me with a big basket of my home grown strawberries. Wow, what a gal!!!! I finished filling one of the 1 gallon freezer bags already partially filled in the freezer and started a new bag. I need to make another batch of jam this week and may fill the next bag by the end of the week….. I will be swimming in my heavenly strawberry jam – Yum!!!!

Today was a partial day in the garden and I only sweated through one T-shirt. I weeded, watered and finished pulling up the last of my Detroit Red beets. I still have a very beautifully leafed beet variety that I forgot the name of yet to harvest. Very nice looking tops and we will see about the beet taste soon. I made a pickled beet recipe today to eat like a cold salad – it is pretty tasty.

 I used about 3 + cups of skinned and sliced up roasted beets. FYI – drop the hot roasted beets in ice water and the skins nearly remove themselves. I boiled ¾ cup of cider vinegar and ¾ cup of beet juice….. I poured almost a cup of hot water over the beets in a bowl to make the beet juice. Once that mixture was boiling I added 2 tbs. sugar, 2 whole cloves, 3 whole black peppercorns, a bay leaf, about ¾ tsp. of sea salt and about a cup of chopped red onion. Brought it back to a boil and poured over the beets. Refrigerated for a couple of hours and man, they are pretty darned good! Recipe is almost exactly like one I found in allrecipes.com. Great recipe resource!

Updates;

The Mason Bees. They are rapidly depositing eggs and filling the tubes. I have about 11 of the tubes filled and sealed. Should have quite a few more next season.

The worms. I checked on the poor guys Saturday when I returned and they were trying to escape. I had neglected both the food they need and the bedding necessary for their comfort. I was able to feed them a big a big batch of strawberry parts and tops – see the comments about my lovely wife above, some old bread, beet cuttings and other veggie scraps….. They seem to be back to work and not complaining now.

My Green Beans. The Kentucky Pole beans are leaping and now blossoming. The bush beans look to be on the same time table.

Asparagus. Slowing down and will let them fern out. I put some Martha Washington in a few weeks ago and they are sprouting.

Tomatoes. Slow but setting fruit….except my Brandywine – I do have a few blossoms on one but I have my fingers crossed. The Juliet tomatoes and Creole tomatoes are doing well.

Cucumbers. I put up twine to let them climb this morning….part of the sweaty shirt stuff. My cucumbers in my friends backyard ( I put a 4×4 patch in his yard) are blossoming and way ahead of mine! Grrrrrrrrrrr.

Enough for now, hopefully blackberry news soon!

Bishop

Jammin’ with my Jam

April 9, 2011

Bishop berrries, Canning, Gardening, jam and jelly , , , 1 Comment

Over the first few weeks of my strawberry season I have been able to gather and freeze enough of the berries that weren’t eaten fresh to make some jam. The first picture show the beginning of the process – the thawing of the berries. I just love how they smell as they begin to thaw and give off the wonderful aroma of “real” Strawberries.  They may not look quite as pretty as those in the store but they make up for it in flavor.

Last night – Friday the 8th of April was my canning night. It takes 6 cups of berries to make the jam and I had thawed a bag containing about 7.25 cups. It is very important to accurately measure when making jam so I scooped out the excess and added it to the bag in the freezer being held for the next batch. Can’t hardly wait to make more jam!!!

  I use “Sure-Jell’ powdered pectin labeled for less or no sugar jams. I use the” less” sugar  recipe, 4 cups of sugar vs. 6 used in regular jams. Not a lot of difference in sweetness but a noticeable improvement in the fruit taste. It gels nicely and is oh so good on my toast in the mornings. I may get frisky on the next batch of strawberry jam and try using a complimentary spice for some variety ……. any suggestions …… drop me a note and I will give it a try.  Look for  report back in a future installment.

A peek at the future – my blackberry vines are beginning to set berries. I have 3 varieties and the season should be a good one. I should start picking at the end of this month and stop near the end of May…… Blackberry jam is my favorite!!!!

TTFN

Bishop

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