Weeding between the lines

By Jim McGinty

Looking out my window in late February, I see no signs of greenery, fresh growth, or spring:  I do see about 30 inches of crusty snow, patches of treacherous ice, and – wait, what’s that?!  Is that the sound of opportunity knocking, garden-planning-wise??  

YES, it’s time to think about what we want to plant, and hopefully, harvest this spring and summer – time to rough out the what goes where in our 2018 garden, what seeds to start indoors, and what new gardening technique to try, or new crop to grow.

Besides, you were just lolling around on the recliner, eating stale Christmas cookies, and looking for something (anything!) good to watch on your 500+ channels.

Instead, let’s engage our gardening brain and think ahead to warm July: tall or bushy, green, productive plants, and delicious edibles growing exactly as we planned back in late winter. 

Here at Rancho McGinty, we are planning to reduce the amount of some crops we grow (fewer potatoes, kohlrabi, and squash – the decision to grow less squash took NO time), and instead focus on a salad garden, a salsa garden, lots of garlic, and sweet corn. We have a long undistinguished history with sweet corn – our growing season is short, our patience is thin, and the whole process seemed a waste.

These days, there is exists a number of short season (70+ days or so) varieties of sweet corn:  “Kandy Korn” from Gurney’s (513-354-1492), “Painted Corn” from Baker Creek (417-924-8917), “Yukon Chief” from Denali Seed (if they can grow veggies and corn in Alaska, we can grow them here!  231-421-4496), and “Early Vee” from Territorial Seed (800-626-0866).  

My gardening partner and wife Pat and I plan to grow sweet corn as transplants in biodegradable pots (corn roots hate to be disturbed), and later as seeds, once the garden soil temperature reaches 60 degrees or more. Corn is a heavy feeder, so we plan to use LOTS of aged chicken poo (our birds may not produce many eggs at -6 degrees, but their manure output has not slackened off a bit!), rototilled into the open garden early in spring.  We’ll use drip irrigation, so at least an inch of water is placed where it will do the most good, right at the plant roots – overhead watering can produce plant disease, and it’s also a waste to spray expensive water into the summer hot air. We’ll put the transplants out there about 15 inches apart, after there is no danger of frost, and we’ll seed the corn patch in a “block” (more than three rows wide, about 3 feet apart) to encourage pollination. We may try planting and seeding through black plastic film: the black plastic not only helps raise the soil temperatures, it also reduces weed growth, as corn hates competition.

When the baby stalks are about 6 inches tall, we’ll side dress the plants with either blood meal or aged chicken poo, on a weekly basis, until the stalks are knee high. If we decide to use the black plastic mulch, we’ll apply a liquid, filtered, homemade tea version of the blood meal or poo using an inline injector on the drip irrigation system. All this effort to raise sweet corn – we’ll know by August just how successful (or not) we are.

March is a good time to spray your fruit trees with dormant oil, providing the daytime temps are above freezing, and now is the time to finish your late winter fruit tree pruning – remember, you’ll have fewer water sprouts if you prune before the warm weather returns (warm weather? Yes, please). Speaking of trees, remember to spread those woodstove ashes all around the drip lines of your trees – you’ll see more and higher quality fruit.

Now is also the time to remove all the berry canes that bore fruit last year – those canes are probably yellow or brown now, as differentiated from this year’s fruit bearing canes which will be green or purple.

If you are growing currants, this is a great time to lop off all those older (3-years-plus) trunks – you will appreciate the larger harvest, and fewer thorn punctures.

While there is still snow on the ground, you (and your bank account) will benefit from taking a seed inventory: after several years of reduced seed crop yields, seed packets are both more expensive, and filled with fewer seeds. Count what you already have, and order your seeds now – and don’t forget your gardening neighbors, as they may have seed to trade.

Finally, this is a good time to start some of those precious seeds so the transplants will be ready to go outside in a timely manner:  tomatoes, peppers, parsley, onions, chard, eggplant, cauliflower, Brussels sprouts, broccoli, and cabbage will all benefit from a transplant headstart in the open garden.

GARDEN CALENDAR   

On March 8, from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m., our plucky plant platoon, the Pend Oreille County Master Gardeners, will offer a class, “Growing the best vegetables, fruit, and flowers,” at the WSU Extension Office (227 S. Garden Ave., Newport). Lots of local information on how to improve your garden yield; and for the proud, competitive gardener, there will also be information on how to enter your beautiful produce into our local county fairs. You can call the office (509-447-2401) for more information, and to register for the class.

On the 13th of March at 7 p.m., our local gardening club will meet in Camden Grange for the first time in 2018: from our members, you can expect lots of weather whining, loud lies about last year’s harvest, and lots of defiant drivel on just how good this year’s garden will look and produce. Members are asked to bring along a favorite snack or non-adult beverage, and any unwanted plant seeds or cuttings for our trading table. We will have a class on seed starting for the beginner, and information on how to garden in our challenging environment, from local gardeners who actually know what they are doing. You can always check here at the blog for the latest information.

On March 15, our favorite Master Gardeners will offer another class this month, on gardening with kids. This class, which runs from 7-8:30 p.m. at the Extension Office, will NOT provide tips and tricks on how to keep those young garden slaves (I mean “youthful garden volunteers”) from checking their cellphones every two minutes, while meantime ignoring every instruction you emphasized five minutes ago!  I’m telling you, cattle prods are the answer to many (MANY!) of those…oops. So this class WILL offer may helpful hints on how to make your collective (adults and young helpers) gardening experience both positive and life-affirming. You can call the Extension Office for more information, and to register for the class. 

That’s it for this month.  Remember, all that snow and ice WILL eventually melt away, leaving mud. Just sayin’.

Garden club harvest dinner warning notice!

We will assemble at Camden Grange at 7 p.m. tonight (Tuesday, Oct. 10) for our annual Harvest Dinner. Club members and visitors who hold coveted Garden Club Gnomes are asked to bring the little guys along, so they can hold their annual Conclave. I have listed below the menu offerings volunteered by our club members, and what they have promised to bring:

Carolyn - gelatin salad or garden salad

Diane - green salad and dressing

Jane - Mediterranean eggplant (!), and almond feta cheese

Marlene (the over-achiever!) - potatoes romanoff, and olive loaf

Dow and Rudi - spring rolls

Leon and Virginia - something veggie

Steve B. - chocolate chip cookies

Dixie - zucchini (!) squares

Sandy C. - cake

Mary Lee - cake

The garden club will provide ham and fried chicken, and drinks

Barbara M. will provide table settings, decorations, and door prizes - thank you Barbara!

Please be prepared to talk about your 2017 gardening season (what went right, what went the other way), and what you plan to do differently, gardening-wise, in 2018.

see you tonight,

Jim

509-292-0326

Weeding between the lines

By Jim McGinty

Our little “frost pocket” garden was recently blessed by three nights of 29-degree-Fahrenheit temperatures, then by two-and-a-half inches of rain at 67 degrees for three days. Our gardening season ended on quite a traumatic note: though we covered the “sensitive” crops (tomatoes, peppers, ornamental squash, blackberries, etc.) with a frost blanket (Ree-May, in our case), most of those plants are now blackened and crisp. Still struggling, though, are the cold-hardy crops of broccoli, carrots, sugar beets, chard, collards, parsley, mint, and cabbage. 

In the orchard, the apple trees are loaded with a crop of late-ripening fruit, and the Italian prune-plum trees provide tasty snacks as we work – remember that plum trees like to be pruned for dead, diseased, or damaged branches right after harvest.

I’m rolling wheelbarrows of barnyard “litter” (Pat and I like to convert our limited income into food for the goats and sheep; they in turn convert our money into trampled hay and poo) into the garden, in preparation for the 2018 gardening season, and will top that layer off with a couple of pickup-truck loads of seasoned cow and horse poo, as well. Once that goodness has been rototilled into the soil, I’ll plant the garlic, clean up the spent plants and debris (if the pulled plants are disease-free, they’ll go into the compost bin, along with some of the aforementioned litter), and start working on firewood.  Whew!

If you are still harvesting veggies and fruit, and have extra produce, please remember our local food bank: the North County Food Pantry (509-292-2530, 40015 N. Collins Road, Elk) will gladly accept your donations.

Out in the garden, now is a great time to divide that over-crowded rhubarb plant: simply sharpen a shovel, stab it into the center of the plant, cut out a pie-shaped piece (about one fourth of the total plant), fill in the newly-opened cavity with topsoil or compost, wash the pie-shaped piece with garden water, and replant. More rhubarb next year, just in time for rhubarb-and-strawberry pie season.

Now is also a good time to prune out all of the brown raspberry canes (the ones that produced fruit this year), leaving only the green canes for next spring.

Recommendations from Rancho McGinty from our 2017 garden experience:

Cucumber: Burpless Cucumber (yes, that’s it’s actual name), planted in early September, and still producing.

Tomatoes:  Koralik, cherry-sized, very prolific; Silvery Fir Tree, salad-sized, a consistent heirloom winner; Candy Bell, grape-sized, tough skin, good flavor.

Peppers:  Sweet Pickle Pepper and Greek Pepperoncini, abundant harvests; Traveller jalapeno, mild flavor, moderate heat.

Radish:  German Giant, the longer they grow, the better they taste. Try planting with some aged chicken poo for increased flavor.

Squash (?!):  Small Wonder spaghetti squash, Reba acorn squash. The chickens and a smattering of deluded people eat them.

Brussels Sprouts: still trying to grow them, despite limited sprouts and unlimited aphids.

Cabbage: Conical Head, split heads, not recommended.

As you finish with your garden tools, remember to store them out of the winter weather. If you have the time and space, you could save your expensive shears, shovels, rakes, etc. from rusting by removing all the garden dirt and coating the steel parts with oil. Wooden handles can be saved from disintegrating (and splintering, OUCH!), by sanding the handles with 100-grit sandpaper, and coating the handles with your favorite wood preservative (boiled linseed oil, polyurethane, Watco oil, etc.).

While you are resting from your garden endeavors, you might take a look at the 2018 seed catalogs: ordering early is always a good idea, and the seed companies are currently offering substantial discounts.

GARDEN CALENDAR   

On the 7^th of October, those frolicking food and flower fructifiers, the Master Gardeners of Pend Oreille County, will offer a hands-on Practical Pruning class in Newport, at the River Mountain Village Assisted Living Center (608 W. Second St., Newport). The class will discuss and demonstrate how to prune perennials, shrubs, and trees, as taught by Tim Kohlhauff, and runs from 10 a.m.-2 p.m. Cost is $5, and it would be a good idea to dress appropriately for the weather and for outdoor work (bring your own gloves, pruning tools, and maybe a snack). You can register for the class by calling the W.S.U. Extension Office at 509-447-2401.

On the 10^th of October, our local garden club will hold its last meeting for the 2017 season, and also conduct our annual Harvest Dinner, starting at 7 p.m. in Camden Grange. We’ll meet one last time this year to discuss what worked in our gardens, and talk about what didn’t work quite so much, and also eat great food! Club members are asked to bring side dishes, desserts, or miscellaneous (biscuits, condiments, margarine, special beverages, etc.), enough for their families and two additional hungry gardeners. Our club will provide the protein (ham and chicken, if I’m unable to harvest something fairly fresh on the side of Highway 2), and non-alcoholic beverages. Club members are asked to call me (509-292-0326) so we can organize the menu (for one previous Harvest Dinner, our “disorganized” menu consisted of only desserts – a meal to remember!).

If you are the fortunate caretaker of a club garden gnome, you are asked to bring the little guy to the meeting, so they can conduct their annual Gnome Conclave. 

On the 14^th of October, the Pend Oreille County Master Gardeners will offer an entirely appropriate class on Preparing your Garden for  Winter, at the W.S.U. Extension Office (227 S. Garden Ave., Newport), from 10 a.m. to noon. The Master Gardeners will discuss and show how to put your garden to bed, with a tour of their rapidly-expanding demonstration garden. Topics include plant protection, pruning, mulching, and tool care; the class costs $5, and you can register by calling the Extension Office at 509-447-2401.

That’s it for this year – rest over the winter, and store up energy for next year’s Best Ever Garden. I’ll be back in March, 2018.

Visit our blog to stay current with club activities.

Projector screen, anyone?

Dave Benscotter is asking if anyone has a projector screen we can use for the meeting tomorrow evening. We have the laptop and projector, but a screen would be great. 

Please let me know if you have a projection screen available.

Thanks, 

Jim

I almost forgot!

Please remember to bring some of your favorite snacks/treats to tomorrow evening's garden club meeting, to share with other club members.

I will be asking at the meeting for an update on everyone's garden, what worked, and what did not.  example: Pat and I had unexpected excellent results from using kale plants as aphid trap plants – those nasty critters love kale more than our potato plants – and the giant sugar beets (mangles) are huge this year: great, cheap livestock feed.

see you tomorrow evening,

Jim

509-292-0326

Garden club meeting warning notice!

We will assemble at Camden Grange at 7 p.m. this Tuesday evening (Sept. 12) for an evening with our favorite apple sleuth, Dave Benscotter. Dave will be updating us on what he is investigating this year (old apple orchards and how he locates them from historic records, extinct (?) apple varieties, methods of identifying trees, etc.), and how he is progressing in his search. If you have apple questions, bring them along (you could also bring edible questions!), and photographs are helpful. 

Also, remember to ink an entry on your October calendar for our annual club Harvest Dinner: Oct. 10 at 7 p.m. in Camden Grange. The club will provide the main protein course (road kills have been numerous lately, and the heat doesn't taint the meat much at all), and drinks (non-alcoholic, of course). Club members are asked to bring a side dish made from their gardening efforts (enough for four hungry gardeners), and if you are the honored keeper of a club garden tour gnome, please bring the little fella along for their 2017 Gnome Conclave.

see you at Camden Grange, 

Jim

Weeding between the lines

By Jim McGinty

Finally, harvest time in the garden! Tomatoes, peppers, second-crop broccoli, third-crop radishes, blackberries, strawberries, and much more. The trick now is to finish the season with more ripe veggies and fruit: you will have to decide (I know, decision-making can be tough, or maybe not, I don’t know…) whether to clip off those baby plant flowers, and focus on finishing the crop of existing tomatoes, etc., or to leave those flowers, and hope/pray for a long, hot autumn. Lots of small, green tomatoes, or fewer, but red, ripe tomatoes – hmmm.

Here at Rancho McGinty, the potato and onion plants are starting to keel over, so we’ll be harvesting a LOT of spuds and onions – just in time for late night breakfasts: fried potatoes, onions, and garlic, with an overeasy egg or two. Sounds mighty good.

Our monster squash trellis is easily 6 feet tall, and 14 feet wide and deep – much bigger than our Subaru station wagon! If you want construction details for your own squash trellis, you can see pictures of the PVC frame, drip irrigation, and layout information here on the blog – just look back at the entries from summer 2016.

Speaking of the chicken squash trellis, I’ve been trying a new (to me, anyway) technique to encourage more and bigger zucchinis, spaghetti and acorn squash, etc.: once a week I prune back the older, larger leaves, leaving open spaces for the sun and wind to enter the green, heaving mass. My theory is that more sunlight stimulation will produce more fruit, and better windflow through the tubular jungle will reduce humidity-borne diseases like powdery mildew. If I can see squash blossoms and daylight back in there, it might improve the harvest – we’ll see, and the chickens LOVE those spiky squash leaves and vines.

Out in the orchard, be sure to prune (no pun intended) your plum trees right after harvest:  remove all the dead, damaged, or diseased limbs, and be sure to remove all the plums – don’t leave any to fall to the ground and turn into winter housing for evil insects.

Continue to remove any water sprouts from your fruit trees – you’ll know the sprouts when you see them:  shiny, new bark, pencil thick or so, and shooting right up to the sun, through the middle of your tree.

Garlic planting time is nearly upon us – at the end of September, just ahead of the rains (I hope!). I like to amend my soon-to-be planted garlic patch in early September with composted/aged cow and horse poo, and barnyard straw and litter. Rototill all the good stuff under, wet it down, and later plant the cloves: 4-inch-deep furrows, about 18 inches between rows. I plant the cloves pointy end up, about 6 inches apart in the rows, cover the cloves with dirt, and compact the area above the rows with the tines of a bow rake, to ensure good soil contact. Wet the area, and cover with a 6-inch-thick layer of mulch (leaves, pine needles, tax returns, etc.).

It’s time to stay weather alert – we saw 40 degrees Fahrenheit one evening here at Rancho McGinty just recently – the evil “F” word (“frost”) should never be far from our planning:  sheets of frost blanket (Ree-may or Agribon available locally from Northwest Seed and Pet in Spokane), flannel sheets, even light tarps can keep your precious crops safe-ish.

GARDEN CALENDAR

On the 12^th of September, our local garden club will meet in Camden Grange at 7 p.m., for an indoor meeting with our own club member, and favorite W.S.U. apple detective Dave Benscotter, for an update on his quest to find and identify heirloom and ancient apples in our area of the world. Dave offered a dynamite presentation last year on what he is doing in our local, older orchards, and answered a LOT of questions on apple trees in general – don’t miss this meeting, and if you have older, unidentified apple trees in your orchard, please bring some apple samples – if nothing else, we can help you dispose of those tasty questions .

On the 14^th, those green, gardening gurus, the Master Gardeners of Pend Oreille County, will offer a class, Pollinators: Honey Bees and Natives, taught by my own honey bee herself, Pat McGinty, and Master Gardener Vicki Green. The class will discuss and illuminate methods of attracting and feeding these beneficial insects: the class will run from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m., in the W.S.U. Extension Office (227 S. Garden Ave., Newport), and will cost $5 per person, and you can call the office at 509-447-2401 for further information or to register for the class.

On the 20^th, I will be teaching a class on planting my favorite bulb, garlic! We will learn how to select, plant, encourage, and harvest this delectable member of the rose family – the class will be in the Newport College Center (1204 W. Fifth St., Newport), and will run from 6-8 p.m.  Cost is $17 per person, and you can call to register for the class at 800-845-3324, or you can register on-line at www.sccel.spokane.edu/ACT2.

On the 27^th, I will be teaching a class on backyard fruits and berries, with an emphasis on selecting, planting, maintaining, harvesting, and (my favorite part!), eating the good stuff.  The class will cost $17 per person, will run from 6-8 p.m., in the Newport College Center, and you can register for the class at either of the two above contacts.

Speaking of berries, our Doyle blackberries are ripe and ready to blenderize with vanilla ice cream – I have to go collect berries now, before I drool and need a new keyboard.