Garlic is up.. mostly.

Just doing some research on the garlic growing stuff I've got and it turns out it's time to harvest some of them. The ones I've got out of the ground right now are happily drying on the back porch out of the direct sun on the mesh table we have. They're awfully small looking things, but I guess that's all I'm gonna get. Looks like a couple got killed off and didn't grow underground and another one looks like it just plain ol' got too far along and keeled over and broke up into pieces.. but I've got ten good ones so far. Not all of them were quite ready. Here's a shot of the evidence:

Updates.. Hops, tater's and stuff.

Everything is still slowly moving along now.. starting to pick up the pace, but still pretty slow. The cold night time temps is still holdin' us back I think. I think I see some flea beetles out there, but they're not hurting anything so far. Still no slugs, which was what was killing me last year. I'm keepin' an eye out fr them, though. Got the last Global Bucket project finished up finally and put a Roma in it the other day, and here she is on the deck, next to the EarthBox and the other bucket project..

Also filled and hung the new Revolution Hanging Planter from Gardners Supply. This is a spinoff of the Topsy Turvy, of course, but it's way better built with a zippered enclosure, steel coated wire surround and a self watering feature from the top from a one gallon reservoir. Curious to see how this goes, as I've never done the upside down thing before..

Revolution Planter

Cascades

The Smart Pot farm

Upper bed

Brussels Sprouts, arguably the strongest thing in the beds right now..

Lower bed

Potatoes...

Potatoes are starting to come up.. check it:

That didn't take long.. sprouted right up once we got some soil onto them. Nice.. the hops plants are both doing well now. I'm constantly untangling them every day to keep them somewhat on the trellis..

Cascades

Here's the little Fatalii I put out in the Smart Pot.. a bug did a little damage right there on the left side, but it'll make it. The yellow bit there was a bit of a cold snap that came along that I didn't see coming and failed to take precautions against. I was in NYC, so I was a bit far away to work on that part, though..

And finally, some Arugula poking up in the lower bed. Hard to see, but it's coming along too. Everything else is just a bit larger and doing quite fine. Better than last year, so far, I'd say. Much more orderly with the SFG method. So far, so good..

Arugula

Earthbox filled and Smart Pots up and running..

Took some time yesterday and the day before to fill the Earthbox up with the mix I'll be using this year for all my containers out of the beds. It's called ASB Greenworld Growers Mix, and it's a pretty standard Peat based mix, pH balanced to just slightly acidic and filled up with a bunch of Perlite too.

Jalapenos installed. That's gonna be a lot of growth in a small space..

So that's the mix, and there's the Earthbox. The Earthbox company says, seriously, to put in 6 Jalapenos in that thing.. so, that's what I did. Last year I just ran with two Hab's in the box and they grew like gangbusters... but they're saying I should have done six plants arranged like shown in the pic above. the only problem I see now is the slow release food I've put in there is good for three months, but these things will probably grow and produce well into the month of September. I might have to open the top and re-fert the thing in August some time. We'll see how that goes.

In other news, I also filled up the #15 (15 gallon) fabric Smart Pot and installed the potatoes just under the soil. They're already chitted and wanting to grow.. it won't be long before they pop right out of there and reach for the sky. I got 5 of 'em in the big pot, per their instructions as well. In the photo below, you can see the #15 pot int he middle, surrounded by the smaller #7 pots, which will each be holding one chile peper plant. I've got one plant in each, except for the lower left pot right now, which is reserved for a Tobasco chile that's just not quite big enough to be outside just yet.

Potato in the middle, surrounded by chiles. 

Also, I finally located the horseradish plant that was missing for a while out back.. but here it is. Coming up strong in the herb garden area which I put down all that manure on last fall. That trick seems to have worked well.. the chives are growing like wildfire too. I'll probably put out some basil in a couple more weeks.. I should start some up today in the basement, I guess.

And finally, above, a pic of the upper bed as it now stands. Garlic is strong, Brussels Sprouts doing well, a bunch of Bell, Jalapeno, Hot Cherry chili's all in place.. starting to look like a garden, finally. :) My dad says that this stuff should not be here so early in the season, and that they're all going to die in a wicked cold snap.. but we'll show that old man how it's done. Clearly, he has not read Elliot Coleman's book, the Four Season Harvest. Read up, old man! It's time to learn some new tricks! ;-)

Garden update.. and invaders!

I totally forgot about this one till just now, and I'll tell you why. Here's some pics of the garden as it stands now. i planted a bunch of cold weather stuff, and it's sitting under the hoop house covering now. Then, I went to check on the horseradish on my way back to the house and it's *covered* with caterpillars. Different ones than those who were attacking my radishes earlier this year.. bigger, greener. Check 'em out:

No, that ain't tequila. I think they're Cabbage worms. Look what these bastards did to my plant!

Hand picking is the answer to these as well, so I just pulled another 25 of the damn things off and drowned them in the Jar of Death. It felt good.

Check these Tomatoes out.. you think I could get some red in these things before they freeze solid?

And this.. It's October isn't it? Why are these chille's still producing?

Turnips are behind, but we're getting close to harvesting these guys..

The other stuff is doing well.. little green things popping up all over the place. I'm not convinced the lettuce will make it all the way through, but I've heard great stuff about Arugula and Spinach for cold weather growing, to say nothing of the Chard. The Arugula is already all out of the ground, sprouted like a champ. The Spinach is not up yet though, and neither is the chard. But those have time.. they're not quite up to the 7-14 days germination time yet. Check this radish square. Two days and they're out of the ground!