Tag: lettuce

Captain’s log: March 14th 2019

~ Homo neanderthalensis ~ 10 Comments

Well I had to push the grand soil haul til tomorrow, but that didn’t mean I could rest on my laurels.

The weather is beautiful out- and coupled with the return of daylight savings I have a ton more usable time out in the garden. It was around 70 degrees out in the hottest part of the day today, and while I know a week from now we are going to have some more rain, it truly feels like the beginnings of Spring.

See- a bumble bee! This is the third or fourth I’ve seen this year so far, which is exciting. Just because I don’t grow most flowers doesn’t mean I can’t have a bee friendly garden. Most of my herbs flower wonderfully, and I’m planting more.

The blue pot is the garlic chives 2.0 after the wind killed pot 1.0- the other pot on the stand is new, and houses some regular chive seeds.

What- I like chives ok? Why not have both? Besides all varieties of chives have wonderful edible flowers that make bees go crazy. And more bees means more tomatoes later and more green beans and more cucumbers… you get the idea.

I also wanted to pot up some cilantro. I keep getting cilantro and planting it in the shade herb bed and having it grow just plain weird. Well- turns out this was 100% my fault. Cilantro is like dill- transplanting cilantro tends to make the plant all screwy.

Ok so I’ll sow it by seed into a pot like I did with the dill, only the only pot the right size is the plastic pot that we all know the wind likes to knock over…

The solution is rocks. The solution is always rocks.

Those are a couple of big rocks I found that I plunked down in the pot before I filled it with soil and seeds. Made it good and heavy- try to knock that over wind!

(Just kidding wind please be cool)

I’ve also been pretty pleased with the seedlings so far, except for the one Boston pickle I started indoors during the deluge- it died in the night. I just sort of shrugged and put another Boston pickle cucumber seed in the pot- you can’t really plant cucumbers in their bed til around May so I have plenty of time to screw around with seeds and grow a few strong plants for transplant.

Rip Boston Pickle plant. As you can see the rest of the older seedlings are doing really great- as are some of the younger ones…

All 12 of the Joi Choi came up! Which… is problematic as at the moment I only have room for 8 of them! Luckily with the soil infusion I’m getting tomorrow I’ll have room for plenty more and it’ll be a while before these little guys are ready for transplant anyways.

I’ve also started some mustard greens and Japanese spinach as nothing but 2 radishes ever came up in the side bed and it’s good shady real estate for greens.

The warmth and sun has really reinvigorated some of the herbs. All the water plus now the warmth has made my sage plant very happy. It wasn’t looking so hot in January so I’m glad it seems to have rallied. I really like sage, which is why I’m a little sad I’ll probably have to pull the purple sage.

I mean- that’s just not right.

The other herbs in this bed are doing well- including the hyssop which I never even thought I wanted.

Truly magnificent. That should flower very nicely in June- a real treat for the bees.

Another win- the potted mints. The mint thunderdome is roaring back to life after its winter slumber- and my two individual mints are growing with real vigor. This is the pineapple mint which is a real pretty plant. Smells fantastic too.

Happily both of the potato bags are also going strong, I’ll have to put more soil in soon. I’ve made up my mind on the potato front- I’m definitely going to get a few more bags and some proper seed potatoes and grow a few more. That whole middle area has a fair amount of room and a medium amount of sun- and I’m the sort who could eat my weight in spuds. Not to mention my mother who’s diet is fairly limited- like the zucchinis I will be growing and the carrots I am growing, it makes sense to grow her some more potatoes, which are some of the few vegetables she can eat.

The first bean seeds are in- we’ll see if they take- it’s early but the soil is just warm enough.

I’ll leave you with lettuce.

Get it- *leave* you, sounds like leaf…

Aw forget the bad pun. It’s pretty lettuce.

Captain’s log: February 21st 2019

~ Homo neanderthalensis ~ 3 Comments

Today was a busy day. Actually a busy couple of days, but that’s not important.

A lot of what I’ve been doing is watering now that we’ve had some clear weather- it’s sunny but cool. Heat evaporates water in the soil, but the chief evaporator is the sun- so even though it’s not even above 55 most days- I’ve had to water a fair amount last couple of days.

Part of that of course is the plants I’ve been putting in- new transplants need water no matter the weather. Both the mints and the chervil seems to be doing well- but so are the herbs I put in last month which is a sigh of relief.

Here’s my pretty Italian oregano which took pretty much immediately. All the herbs are growing well.

Today when I got outside to start work- I had a visitor.

He or she is a local kitty, I think one of the ones born last year, and this one and their siblings keep taking vacations into my garden. I’m pretty sure this is the one who put his paws in my arugula pot- and here you can see them hard at work looking at a vole hole. The minute he saw me he went “?!!!!” And sprang backwards over the fence in fear. Entertainingly he kept coming back to keep tabs on my work.

In local news outside of my garden- here’s the toll of the wind and rain, a tree got knocked over in my local park and crashed through the fence. Which illustrates how nutso the weather was, and will be. Its clear for now, but my wish of a longer spell of dry weather has not been answered- it looks like scattered showers or worse are in San Francisco’s future. Hopefully no more downed trees will follow.

I pulled the purple Bok Choy, which for whatever reason had totally passed from edible to stringy stalks- so the Joi Choi can survive until I can eat them. And I will be eating them- they are delicious. Into the compost bin with the non leafy Bok Choy’s!

And look at those lettuces! I am a total convert to the temple of raising lettuce from seed.

And speaking of seeds…

I started several seeds in little seedling pots. Specifically I started 6 sunflower seeds, 6 romanesco broccoli, 6 cucumbers, (3 telegraph 3 Boston pickle) 6 zucchini (3 Nimba 3 green bush) and 6 lipstick peppers. They are all living inside for the moment- as I don’t trust the wind and temperature outside. I used regular potting soil mixed with a little sure start, as I tried some seed starter mix and it was so damn light it wouldn’t take water. Potting soil is better.

Once these sprout it’s off to the greenhouse bench with them! But that will be several weeks from now.

The spinach bed has been overgrown and weedy for too long, so I pulled the spinach and amended the soil so I could plant by seed.

A back row of purple snap peas, a row of radishes, a zig zag row of mustard greens, and a final front row of green onions, since only a few of the green onions I planted in the big 4×4 bed have sprouted.

Now that’s some sexy dirt. We’ll see what takes in the temperature and upcoming wet, but that’s why I’m starting with peas that have a lot less stringent temperature requirements than beans.

Of course I was being spied on while I worked….

Spooky! Kitty kept coming back as I worked and then fleeing as soon as I turned to coo at it.

I wish no one in the house was allergic, otherwise I’d try to befriend the poor feral. But me and mom would need hospitalization after being close to a house cat so it is what it is. At least kitty and his siblings take care of the rats.

The turnips are starting to look really pretty in the evening sun. Turnips never fail me.

Speaking of the infallible, look at that thyme! Both plants, big leaf and French growing huge after all that rain. Thyme is like mint in that it should probably be in a pot- but it’s less of a wanderer than mint so you can take a chance on it. It’s definitely more thyme than I can eat, but it’s pretty and it smells good so who cares!

And look at that sage! It’s throwing up new leaves! Finally! It looks like it took a rainfall to finally wake up the herb but now it’s going to do nothing but grow. That’s a nice feeling.

Finally the arugula. It’s basically growing wild which is to be expected when you sow it as thickly as I did. The problem with that is the absolute thicket of oxalis growing underneath it. Pulling all that oxalis without seriously damaging the arugula would be almost impossible so I’ve just given up for now. In a month or less I have to pull up almost everything in this bed so I can plant the back with pole beans so IDK the weeds are going to get it- just not anytime soon.

The most amazing thing happened today- but I couldn’t get a photo of it, no matter how hard I tried. I saw the first bumble bee of 2019! It’s late February but as far as I’m concerned spring has sprung because traveling around the mowed weeds was the fattest little bumble butt. Fuzzy and black with yellow trim, buzzing around looking for flowers, I dropped everything to follow her around but I was sadly unsuccessful in snapping a pic. But she was here! The first bee of the year!

It’s gonna be a good year.

The bees have arrived!

Captain’s log: December 8th 2018

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There’s just not a ton to do in the garden with everything so wet and more rain coming soon- but it’s dried out enough that I can take stock of what needs to be done after the next does of wet.

Honestly there are a few things I should be doing *this* weekend but it’s the home stretch of my last semester at University so it’s study time first and garden time last.

First the good news- all the Pac Choi are doing great. Which is as expected, cabbages in general are good growers this time of year, and they’ve all been watered well!

And here’s the other great news- the first of the romaine seedlings have begun to sprout!

The green onions and leeks haven’t sprouted yet but that’s to be expected, lettuce comes up much quicker than onions.

What’s also coming up is weeds! Weeds everywhere, though none as spectacular as the oxalis I pulled last week.

As far as work I have to do in the next few weeks, some of it is wait and see.

The cut back dill plant is very green in the middle, though the other fronds look all mealy and gross- so it will either bounce back by the new year, or it won’t.

I’ve just had terrible luck with dill, which is annoying because I use so much of it when I cook, it would be really nice to have a reliable plant in the back.

Oh boy did I let the mint thunderdome get kinda overgrown. So I’ve got to cut back all the tendrils and twigs and maybe give it a dose of fish emulsion when I give some to the dill.

Then it should be fine, as mint is an undying force.

I’ve been procrastinating on pulling my moldy heat damaged lettuces so there’s a chore for later.

I think I’ll put some snap peas in the top patch. Perfect winter pea, good snacking potential, and most importantly- really easy to grow.

Unlike fucking lettuce apparently

The sorrel is getting gigantic, definitely ready to harvest after the next dose of rain.

Now the (maybe) hatch peppers are interesting. The shishito plant will have to be cut back heavily if I’m to get any peppers next year. The red bell pepper plant is really infested. But the hatch pepper, while weird, is yummy. So I’ll cut it back after I harvest the last of them, but unlike the bells which are getting pulled- I’m gonna keep the hatches.

Whoooo December tomatoes! I have so many growing December tomatoes! I don’t know if they’ll ever ripen but… December tomatoes!

It’s also looking like in a few months I’m going to be overrun by carrots.

This is not a bad thing.

And as expected- the ishkabibble parsley plant has really perked up now that it’s in a pot. It is kinda being caressed by the lemongrass but it’s just going to have to get used to that, I have only so much room on the shade herb table.

Which reminds me of the maintenance I have to do on this site- my map of the garden is wildly out of date- so this week I’m definitely going to draw a new one and post it.

It’ll probably be out of date again within a month- oh well.

Mixed greens bed is sowed

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Did some good work today in advance of the rains- still some risk of a wash-out but I’ll take the chance.

Did the newspaper trick after clearing the old moldy fava bean dirt and the few weeds that had taken root.

Then it was just a matter of dumping a few bags of soil in, which was quite the workout!

I’m not making the same mistake I made with the moldy lettuce- I put a few good shakes of sure start fertilizer after bag of soil 2. See the weird roots of my lettuce might have been a result of not only the freak heat wave right after I planted them- but the lack of good soil microbes. Sure start fertilizer is a good way to inoculate the soil. I like to think of it as soil probiotics.

These are the Pac Choi I’m putting in, the green one is the “Joy” cultivar and the purple one is the “Rosy” cultivar.

I’ve had great luck with Pac Choi. It’s just a Asian cultivar of cabbage, but much more robust and pest resistant. Also easier to grow and the whole thing is edible. Yummy firm stems and green leaves (or purple!) make for a great side dish or stir fry. (Or salad or braised dish or…)

But I like a mixed bed- no mono cultures here!

So since I’ve been having bad luck with the Romaine plants- time to plant romaine from seed!

Two rows that will of course need to be thinned pretty heavily, but hopefully they won’t be washed out by the rains.

But that’s not all…

My dad’s favorite vegetable!

He eats so many of these I’m surprised I haven’t been growing them already!

I think I’d been laboring under the delusion that they’re hard to grow- maybe in other places, but not in our climate!

Three rows and the best thing is that you don’t need to thin them at all. Just a seed every half inch to inch and you won’t need to pull any till they’re full grown and ready to eat!

This is also one of the great advantages of growing in San Francisco as in different climates you’d never be able to grow green onions in winter but here- full speed ahead.

Anyways- it’s a pretty bed.

Romaine at the back which is the shadiest, Pac Choi in the middle, and green onions in the front to capture all the winter sun.

Of course the seeds might get borked by the upcoming torrents of rain- but I have plenty of seeds to re-sow next week in case of disaster.

That being said I am considering mulching over the seeds before the rains and then removing it after- but I haven’t made up my mind on that.

What I am is tired- this was a lot of soil to lug around on a Sunday.

Here’s a picture of some beautiful little cabbages:

God I love Pac Choi.

Captain’s log: November 21st 2018

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Seems like forever since I’ve done anything but the most basic of watering. Some of that was due to having less plants that need less water- and some of that was due to the terrible smoke filled air which made it all but impossible to do anything outside without putting on a mask.

Well there won’t be a ton of watering this week- but for the best of reasons!

The rainy season has begun!

Just in time too- all the particulates are getting washed out of the air and the sweet sweet rain is cleaning up the streets and watering my plants. It was a good long rain from this morning until around 3pm, and we might get more tonight. And tomorrow. And next week!

Ah, slippery concrete!

Because I wanted to make a blog post, and because I like getting wet, I decided to take stock of the garden while it was raining.

My little box of Mitsuba continues to grow, and it’s well drained in that box so I’m not worried about it getting drowned. Besides it’s a woodland plant so sticking it in a shady spot and dumping water on it is sort of how it’s meant to live.

The tomato continues to grow like wildfire, though in order to not have it completely overgrown I’ve stopped fertilizing it, but the sudden flood of water won’t stop it growing that’s for sure. Lots of ripening tomatoes- and the half of the plant that wasn’t tied up has almost completely collapsed so once there’s a break in the rain I’m going to get out there with my soft ties and macgyver the plant into, you know, not falling over.

I just cannot grow a lettuce to save my life. The plants all got borked early on from the sudden late heat wave, so I’m fairly confident that I can pull the bad plants and grow some romaine from seed fairly easily now that it’s reliably cold. (Also best to grow romaine from scratch now that we’ve had yet another recall of it). Not to mention the continued bug problem which the cold should also take care of.

Pretty right? Well looks is about all the shishito peppers are good for. They’re undersized and tasteless. The bell pepper was infested with all the ripe peppers having holes in them and bugs inside.

Ick ick ick.

The hatch are also tasteless- and probably not even hatches, but I might be able to save that plant, because while a few are ripening early there are a few still gaining in size. The shishito plant may be salvageable- if I cut it back and just overwinter it by next summer it might produce. I’m not sure though. Sadly the infested dwarf bell peppers will probably have to be pulled- the pot is too short and the plants roots were all scrunched from the beginning- bugs or no bugs.

The mole pepper just keeps on trucking though and that plant is definitely a contender for perennial pepper.

The sudden downpour and chilly temps is definitely reinvigorating the spinach, and as long as I keep sowing I’ll have spinach all season long.

The arugula doesn’t give a crap about anything except being delicious. I’ll probably cut a bunch soon and then sow some more.

Damnit basil! Stop blooming!

I know I have to cut it back, but it’s too wet to really work in the back right now so it’ll have to wait.

It’s super healthy though- so I’ll have basil for cooking all winter long.

Ok. I am concerned.

We jokingly called our first sorrel plant Audrey II for a reason- darn thing was unkillable and gigantic. And now- before the rains… Audrey III here has already doubled in size. I’m just glad I put it in a pot.

The Plastic Owl Guardian will protect me.

Feed me Seymour

Troubleshooting in November

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It’s been so long since I’ve gardened year round instead of just having a few summer plants and just keeping the herbs- that a few problems are popping up, some of which I’m familiar with, some of which are a little new to me.

The first is simple.

As you can see on my flat leaf parsley in a pot (which is being caressed by the lemon grass) and by the curly leaf parsley in the ground:

Some of the leaves are yellow. This is usually either due to a lack of nitrogen or a lack of water. As both plants are well watered, it’s most likely time to fertilize the herbs. No biggie.

More annoying is my spinach/Swiss chard issue.

This is bug damage right? Or is it heat damage? I’ve sprayed and left bait and I picked to worst of the leaves but the spinach keeps getting damaged. I grew spinach earlier this year and while one or two leaves got a little chewed it was nothing like this. I’m chalking this up to heat stress/bug stress from the heat and hoping by the time the new spinach/Swiss chard sprouts it’s consistently cooler.

The lettuce is crazy though.

The void is where I had to pull another romaine- because the stem had gone all soft and mushy. Is that a fungal problem? Is there like a grub issue? I’ve checked all the other stems and they seem to be fine, and the red lettuce isn’t bothered. Am I watering too much? Too little? I’m so confused.

As for the tomato:

Yes the tomato plant has little baby tomatoes- but it’s also got curling leaves and leaves with brown and yellow spots.

Basically it got hot enough for a growth spurt- but now it’s getting cold enough that I’m pretty sure the plant is shutting down. I think perennial tomato plant is a pipe dream in San Francisco climate conditions.

I just hope it lives long enough for the dozen or so baby tomatoes to ripen, so I am watering (not too much!) and fertilizing regularly like normal.

Didn’t want this post to be too much of a downer, so here’s a picture of some almost ripe baby bell peppers

And I checked these- no holes!

Fall maintenance

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Today the temperature was much more November standard. So it was time for some garden work.

The bushy mess that is my tomato plant needed some trimming, as some of the more yellowed stalks were growing over some of the healthier parts of the plants. They also were kinda aphid breeding areas so I took care of those two. I counted about 7 total baby tomatoes so far, and I fertilized the plant. I also moved the pot a bit so that I wasn’t constantly running into it’s little side frond.

You’ll note there is a tomato cage in the middle of the pot. A completely useless tomato cage.

I also thinned my carrots. Took about half the plants out in what I think was an intelligent way, to give everyone space to grow.

The spinach thinning and cutting took some time. Had to get rid of the plants what were just too heat damaged, and cut off the damaged leaves from the healthy plants. There were also a ton of weeds under the plants, largely due to the fact that it’s been so crazy around here weeding has taken a back seat to life.

The romaine and the red lettuces needed some trimming of the worst outer leaves. Also weeding was needed, along with some snail bait and a good spray with neem oil.

I also cut back the damaged leaves on the Swiss chard and planted more seeds in the dead areas. Along with a light fertilize with fish emulsion- hopefully the temperature cooperates.

The arugula is perfect. I want to kiss it’s peppery leaves. Instead I just have a nibble every time I water. Yum!