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| Spinach |
So the only thing left to plant is beans (and a few left over flowers in pots.) The reason these have not been planted is cause of time. Hopefully Malia and I will get them planted today. We have a small spot in the raised bed behind our house for a few rows. I am thinking that once the spinach is done, I can maybe start a few more rows there. Speaking of spinach, some of the spinach is ready to harvest. Over the weekend it grew quite nicely. I think we actually have enough to freeze some of it as well. I am not a huge fan of spinach unless it is fresh, but it would be handy to have to put in some recipes through the winter.
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| Beets |
I am less impressed with the carrots and the beets. I have a hunch that a number of the carrot seeds were snatched by birds seeing as they when you plant them you leave them uncovered because they require light for germination. (I forgot to take a pic of the carrots.) On the bright side there are a number of them coming up. The beets are doing better than the carrots but I have some significant blank parts in the rows that were planted. I am quite excited about the beets. I was not a huge fan of beets before this past weekend. What changed my mind was a meal we had this past weekend at Shamrock Lodge in Port Carling Ontario. My family goes to Shamrock every 5 years for my parents anniversary. This year they are celebrating 50 years of marriage!! So one of the meals included roasted beets, and they were fantastic! I actually went around and asked everyone if I could eat their beets if they were not going to eat them. I never did talk to the chef, so I still have to locate a recipe to mimic the flavor. We did plant quite a few beets so I will have plenty to time to master the roasting of beets.
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| Potatoes |
So this year we are also trying something new. We have planted some potatoes. A friend of ours was having issue with the city recently because of tires in here yard. Come to find out that they use them to grow potatoes (
check this out for more info). So i traded some facebook messages back and forth with her to find out more information. Long story short, I am a little worried about leaching with tires so I am using this concrete pot that has no bottom. We only have one, so I am also trying some other options that I have not quite narrowed down yet. I may use a 5gallon pail that I cut the bottom out of, or I may build some wooden boxes to put around them. The basic idea is to have them grow up so they produce more potatoes! I really hope this works, cause so far they are easy to grow!
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| Sweet Corn |
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| Sunflower |
This year we are also growing sunflowers and sweet corn. I am not too sure about the corn. It is tucked in the back of our yard against a fence. I am hoping it will get enough sun and be able to pollinate all the stalks. It is recommended that you plant four rows, I only got in two. If it does not work I may have to try another spot for the corn. We are growing the the sunflowers for bird food. I am looking forward to watching the blue jays eating directly off the plant!
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| Herb Garden |
This year we also expanded our herb garden. We have added dill, lavender, parsley and cilantro. We also have sage, marjoram, lemon balm, mint, English thyme, chamomile, stevia and penny royal. Malia loves to grab leaves of the herbs and sniff them. This past weekend she was eating cilantro right off the plant by the mouth full.
Anyways a couple more pictures below of the new raised beds added this year, one with peppers and one with tomatoes!
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| Tomatoes, basil and marigolds |
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| Peppers and marigolds |
