Sure they are dead and not just playing possum?
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Aside from just eating my Cherokee tomatoes raw because of how flavorful and juicy they were, I found they were a perfect combo with avocado and bacon on a sandwich, and spaghetti. They have a rich flavor to them that seems go well with stews soups etc anything with some red meat in it
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Sounds like that’s worth trying then, I may see if I can find some at our local greenhouse!
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Going to boil 'em, mash 'em, stick 'em in a stew?
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Cool site to plan plan plants
http://www.missouribotanicalgarden.org/PlantFinder/PlantFinderSearch.aspx
I have had great luck with vermicompost. Do you have/have you considered a dedicated compost area?
I was able to scale up to a 5-tier vermicompost tower in an apartment office with manageable smell. It’s pretty amazing. We cycle our junk mail and kitchen scraps into compost for our herbs and strawberries.
The rate at which the worms will eat through the input is surprising compared to a traditional compost.
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We have a (non-worm) compost tumbler that’s working pretty well, but we will likely look to scale it up later this year once we get a season of gardening under our belt. I’ll be honest and say I was a little squicked out by worm compost when I first read about it, but I’d be willing to try it now that I have space to keep it further from the house haha.
so is everyone sharing their weird hobbies encouraged?
also worms are great you can sell them to fishermen if you dont fish yourself. makes the compost better quicker and you get more out of it.
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As long as it’s sfw, go for it!
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MAY 5, 2021
Updates
Radish Harvest!
This week I harvested my radishes! Pics of the first batch below. These were roasted and added to couscous.
I ended up getting about three batches around this size from my plastic tote of radishes. They are a little on the small side: partly because of the variety I planted but also I think because I sowed them a little too close together so they didn’t bulb out as well. But I will definitely grow these again, they were a nice early-season win.
Potatoes
Leaves! And more leaves!
This image is already a bit outdated, as I’ve had to roll the bags up and add more straw since this was taken. The leaves are coming up really well.
Meanwhile, the other grouping of potatoes has not leafed out like this yet. Not sure if they just need more time or if the heavy rains we’ve had have rotted them out. Time will tell.
Blueberries
The blueberries have also started producing.
The oldie from last year just put out blossoms:
And the newbie/Perpetua varieties are also fruiting:
One thing I noticed while filming the berries yesterday, is that the Perpetua variety have some black spotting on the leaves. I’m attributing this to the heavy rainfalls mentioned previously-- likely something fungal, bleh. I will probably go out tomorrow and do some pruning on them to increase airflow, as it appears the older (and more ‘stick-like’) variety isn’t suffering from the same thing. Luckily the fruit seems to be unaffected thus far.
The Woods
Not a lot to report, but wanted to share a neat picture of a friend I saw out there last week:
This is an Eastern Box Turtle: Eastern box turtle - Wikipedia. They are currently listed as ‘vulnerable’ due to habitat loss, I’m happy to see him enjoying our woods!
Coming Soon
We have one more freeze slated for this Friday; after that my plan is to get my zucchini and cucumber seedlings planted. I also need to finish preparing a bed for corn/beans/pumpkins.
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Awww, tortl is cute.
Would it be feasible to grow vegetables on raised beds mounted to my van’s ladder rack? Genuine question if anyone’s grown veggies successfully on the road without breaking laws…
From the wetness pictured and what so can see so far, likely a bacterial leaf spot, spreads by splashing (microscopic droplets can travel a long way) and thrives in the cool and prolonged dampness. Your control plan seems sound. What I see here is currently no big deal. It’s only a problem when it’s heavy enough to cause early defoliation. I’ve not heard of bacterial leaf spot affecting the berries themselves though.
If you’d like some free anxiety, here’s a helpful guide full of the many possible horrors of the blueberry universe.
In practice I rarely see serious issues, but then again I deal with commercial blueberries and even organic fields have some kind of default pesticide plan going on, so most things never have a chance to take off.
The ideal chemical treatment is an application of lime-sulfur. Not only is it about as safe of a fungicide for humans as you can get (you should still keep out of eyes, lungs, and stomach…), it’s helpful against many things, including fungus and eriophyid mite migrations. Finding a cheap and easy way to applicate it is the tricky part.
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Also, those are the most beautiful radishes I have ever seen. They look like candy.
Here they are only grown for seed, so they look like this:
The leaves are shotgunned full of holes from flea beetles. The splitting and awful shape are from the radish growing normally, the ground drying out and baking, restricting growth and hardening the skin. Then they start getting irrigated and all the water and sudden growth cause them to literally burst apart and grow however it can. Cycles of this can cause them to push themselves out of the ground as well.
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Well, some states have produce import/export laws, so if you have plans to travel between states, you could be in trouble.
I don’t know about the feasibility of it though.
Goood point… But that shouldn’t be an issue if I migrate out of the states.
I was thinking of some sort of support stake shoved in the dirt of the raised bed that the plants can grow around coupled with a fine mesh net stapled around the edges of the box to protect from hail storms and heavy rain or wind
I really want to try this now lol
I could add timed sprinklers coming from my freshwater tank too
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Thank you! And yeah, probably helps that I’m growing them in an isolated bucket and babying them haha. I’ve never considered how radish seeds are produced, do you just wait long enough into warm season to let them flower, like you do with cilantro?
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It’s probably possible, but might be rough on a van rooftop. You’d need to plant stuff that could handle extreme exposed conditions-- heat from the metal roof, and heavy wind/rain while driving?
Potential candidates that I can think of off the top of my head:
- Rosemary. I had a rosemary plant for two or three years at my old apartment that I basically just neglected. It only died when it finally outgrew the pot it was in. Should be cold-hardy to some extent as well (or at least it will overwinter here in Zone 6).
- Mint. Also thrives on carelessness. It can get out of control quickly though, you’d need a containment plan lol.
- Maybe Potatoes? I’m amazed at how well they do in growbags, you might be able to adapt them for vanlife. You’d need to make sure the potato part wasn’t getting exposed to sunlight though, which could be difficult with wind blowing straw/soil around.
EDIT:
If you wanted to try something in say, the front window of a van, an herb garden is always an option too. I used this kit last year and was pretty happy with the results starting the seeds in our north-facing apartment window. https://www.amazon.com/Certified-Organic-Culinary-Seeds-Collection/dp/B07QHX39YQ/ref=sr_1_2?dchild=1&keywords=organic+herb+garden&qid=1620319183&sr=8-2
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Yeah, for seed crops we deliberately let them bolt and flower, which is something we usually try to prevent in root crops and many vegetables crops. The tricky part is letting the seed pods mature enough to be harvested and deliberately shattered, but not become overly mature to the point where the pods explode at a touch (a trait common to mustards) and go everywhere but the harvester. That difference can happen very quickly, and the variations in field maturity can make it troublesome to make judgement calls.
With radish for seed, we additionally have to deal with the certainty of white rust and various moths here in the Pacific Northwest.
We also do sugar beet for seed, which is good interesting because those have distinct male and female plants, which are planted in rows of two male rows per several females. We also cut away the first bolting, which forces evenness across the field when they bolt again.
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