Harvest Monday + A Call for Fruit Advice

June 29, 2015

What are you harvesting this week? We are harvesting:

• kale
• cabbage
• broccoli
• kohlrabi
• carrots
• beets
• beans
• zucchini
• cucumbers
• potatoes

(I apologize for the blurry picture and the lack of pictures. I’ll load you down with pics for the beginning of July post 😉 )

Only 2 of the 5 kids liked the kohlrabi so I will not be ordering any seeds next year. It was nice to be able to taste test without buying a whole packet.

We gave away everything but the carrots and kohlrabi because truthfully, I just don’t have the energy to do anything with it and I don’t want it to go to waste.

Fruit Conundrum

I am sad to say, one thing we are NOT harvesting is blueberries 😦 We had PLENTY on the bushes as they were forming. I am not positive why we have no more blueberries. I have not been harvesting them, my oldest two have, so I couldn’t tell you if they all disappeared one day or little by little…

The chicks and chickens have been getting out and heading straight for the blueberry patch and we never did catch what was eating our strawberries so it could be critters.

HOWEVER, the strawberries are no longer blooming or fruiting. This time last year, I was harvesting GALLONS of blueberries each day and a few handfuls of our first-year strawberries.

Last year (the last two years, really) was unseasonably wet and chilly. This June, we had a steady stream of high 90s/low 100s  with no rain. Could it be that everything ripened early? Or that it was too hot so they stopped producing? (I’m thinking of the strawberries now)

What do you think? It is very odd and very sad 😦 I typically freeze 10+ gallons every year of blueberries and this year, I froze 0.

Background on the blueberries:

• bought 8.5yrs ago (3yrs old I think)
• started harvesting 7.5 yrs ago
• pruned every year but one (VERY few blueberries that year and they were tiny)
• have had more and more blueberries each year

Any ideas? I am saddened and baffled.

Check out what other gardeners are up to at Daphne’s Dandelions today.

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Harvest Monday

June 22, 2015

This week, my oldest 4 are in VBS most of the day. This means I am fresh out of helpers. Let’s face it, the 2yo and 1yo can’t tell a weed from a seedling so I try to keep them out of the garden.

The oldest two are going to help me harvest before they leave each day but there will be no weeding happening this week.

This week, we have been harvesting:

• cucumbers
• carrots
• zucchini
• blueberries
• raspberries (the groundhog gets most of them)
• baby lettuce
• kale
• potatoes

I picked about 8 tomato horn worms off of my tomato plants this week. It’s weird because last year, we had a lot of them but they never did any damage because the wasps did such a wonderful job laying their eggs on them. I’m not sure why the wasps are missing this year.

Some of our broccoli is starting to head and I noticed, I got a stray kohlrabi seed when I ordered my broccoli seed. I have been meaning to try kohlrabi so here’s my chance. What a treat 🙂

I need to go ahead and harvest some cabbage before it gets decimated by all of the cabbage worms! I never got a chance to cover the brassicas again 😛

All of the harvesting and weeding has been happening before 8:30 or 9am each morning because this June, we have had unseasonably warm weather. It has been in the mid to high 90s all week (some days more than 100) with no end in sight. We typically see these temperatures at the end of July. It will be interesting to see what the rest of the summer looks like.

Our daily summer schedule looks something like this:

1. Wake up
2. Harvest
3. Let chickens out and check on their water
4. Eat breakfast
5. Get dressed, do inside chores
6. Music practice
7. Math drills
8. Play while baby sleeps
9. TV while baby nurses and I fix lunch
10. Lunch
11. Pool
12. Naps
13. Supper
14. Sometimes work in the garden (if we have energy and it’s not too hot still)

Thankfully, we have started seeing some late evening storms. Even though our crops were doing pretty well (thanks to BTE -no need to water), the rain was really welcome. It had been maybe a month since we had a good soaking. This weather is quite the contrast from the last 2 years. The last two summers have been unseasonably cool (I don’t think we ever reached 100 last year) and wet.

A couple other fun pictures: This is the first year I’ve planted zinnias 🙂 So pretty!This is also the first year I’ve grown ground cherries. They are looking good so far 🙂 What are you harvesting? Head over to Daphne’s Dandelions to see what other gardeners are up to this week.