Fall Garden 2009

We are growing a lot of the same things that we did last year but we've added lots of new stuff to the soil. Over the past few weeks, Daniel has added many bales of hay, another load of free wood chips, and a load of municipal compost to the garden. All the plants in these beds we started from seed indoors a few months ago.
Here is a batch of compost tea brewing. Daniel made and applied 2 batches to the garden so far. We were inspired by this gardener in Alaska who sells tea brewing kits and grows amazingly huge veggies. Here is the youtube video about his product--we didn't buy it but made something similar of our own.



The lettuces are looking beautiful and just about ready to harvest.

This is the biggest cabbage we've had. Still has a bit of growing to do.
Here is a bed of kale that has been hit hard by slugs.


Here is a close up. Once Daniel figured out what was destroying these greens, he started going out "slugging" after dark with a flashlight (picking off the slugs). There has been a lot of caterpillars on most of the greens so he's also been on the lookout for those guys during the day. He also sprayed some BT, an organic pesticide. A few of the transplants didn't make it but most of them are starting to come back with new leaves.
Here is a bed of lacinato kale that we've already been harvesting from. In the back of the row are the huge eggplants that are still producing. Behind the eggplants are a few small brussels sprouts that you can't see.
Here's broccoli.
Collards, sweet potatoes and other left over summer veggies.


Our weather is finally cool enough so we can enjoy a fire in the evening. It was a nice way to finish our weekend.

Scarecrow

We are trying to wait a few more weeks before planting our summer veggies. It's hard to hold out for the frost date (April 15) when we have all these wonderfully warm days. We planted lots of flowers this weekend. Some Daniel started from seed and planted around the vegetable garden. They are small now but soon the zinias, marigolds, and daisies will add beauty and attract beneficial bugs to our veggies. I bought some 6 packs of dianthus flowers from Lowe's and we planted them in the front yard.

Ellen had the idea of putting up a scarecrow in the garden. They all worked together and this is our newest addition to the backyard! Look closely and you can see the face Ellen just finished working on.

The Battle Continues

I have already written about our problem with the squash vine borer and the destruction of our zucchini plants. Even after we pulled out all but 2 zucchini plants we are still finding little eggs and evidence that the pest is still lurking around the garden. A few days we have even seen the moth and have been able to swat at and kill 2 of them. Here is a picture of one that Daniel injured and we were able to get a closer look.
We have been finding the eggs on other plants, mostly the acorn and spaghetti squash. Daniel has been on a hunt throughout the days these past few weeks searching for these tiny brown eggs. One morning he even got the girls to search with him and paid them a quarter for every egg they found!
See if you can find one on this plant.:)
We have had pretty good success with keeping the acorn squash plants alive, but it has taken a lot of work. A few days ago I ordered some beneficial nematodes from Planet Natural that we can apply to the garden. They will attack and hopefully get rid of this pesky problem and we can have healthy squash beds without all the worry. A few friends of mine have had really good results for a long time after introducing the tiny beneficial worms.

We have had several zucchinis and I've been making the wonderful sweet bread with them. I've shared this with lots of people already and everyone loves it so I thought I'd post it here. It is a little healthier than the traditional recipe (still has a lot of sugar) and is very tasty! I made up the recipe by combing ingredients from this recipe from Cooking Light and one from my all-time favorite cookbook, Joy of Cooking. Then I substitute Ener-G Egg Replacer for the eggs.

Healthy Zucchini Bread
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
3 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
3 egg substitutes Ener-G Egg Replacer
1/3 cup canola oil
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups sugar
3 cups shredded zucchini (12 ounces)
1/4 cup coarsely chopped walnuts, toasted

Preparation

Preheat oven to 350°.

Mix wet then dry ingredients in separate bowls. Stir together.

Divide batter evenly between 2 (8 x 4-inch) loaf pans coated with cooking spray. Bake at 350° for 40 mins to 1 hour or until a wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool 10 minutes in pans on a wire rack; remove from pans. Cool completely on wire rack.

Animals in and around our home

In the past week or 2 we have come across some amazing animals right around our home. I'll start with the beneficial ones. First we got a bucket full of gambozia fish from some friends who told us they can live in our rain barrels and eat mosquito larvae. So we now have pet fish living in 3 of the barrels. I think they are very happy since I haven't seen any mosquitos around the barrels since we put them in there.
Arianna had fun trying to catch them with her hand before we put them in the rain barrel.

Then Daniel spotted what he thought was a small snake next to the pomegranate bush. He and Ellen scurried around and caught it with a net and bucket. When we did a little research we learned that it was actually a legless lizard called a "slender glass lizard." It is great to have around the yard as it eats insects and even small rodents. Ellen was so excited to get to pick it up. She pet it first then did not hesitate to hold it. We asked her to carry it back to where we found it. She loved it. We had a great lesson on the difference between snakes and lizards and learned lots of great facts about them.


Here's Arianna's snake. She's never been to excited about holding creatures like this so she went and made one so that she could hold her own snake.
I guess it was actually a few days before that Ellen spotted this next creature in the bottom of our yard. We were all standing down there near our compost when Ellen said, " Snake, does anyone else see that snake." We later looked him up and identified him as a yellow rat snake. They are not venimous and are also great to have around the yard since they will eat the small rodents and other guys who may be wanted to taste some of our garden. We were unable to catch him but we did get a nice long look at him. He curled up (as seen in the picture) and froze when we got near him. As you can see our cat Max had walked right past him and decided to lay down right in front of the snake. Not sure why he did that but we were all kind of nervous while Max relaxed next to the snake's mouth. The snake never tried to bite or anything. He eventually moved deeper into the sticks and we couldn't get him.A few days later we found this little wren fluttering around our dining room. Once again Daniel and Ellen were excited about trying to catch him to set him free. Arianna and I were staying away as we were both a little freaked out as he might fly in our face. We trapped him in the girls room and they eventually got him out. Daniel used this cloth to hold him and let us get a closer look. Very sweet.


So now the bad bug news. We've been hoping to not have to deal with these pests but, a few days ago we got a close look at some of our yellowing zucchini plants and realized they had some squash vine borers in them. Oh how sad! Daniel dug out tons of these little rascals in all of the plants. He pulled about 8 plants completely out and we are leaving 3 just to see if they can live after the surgery done to their vines.