In article ,
"FarmI" ask@itshall be given wrote:

"Billy" wrote in message

Fran, how did your garden do this year?

It was a so so year (but then isn't every year like that for some crop or
other?).

The plants that like the heat didn't do as well as they should have as we've
had a coolish summer. The tomatoes are only now turning ripe and coming off
the bushes in any decent number and we're now well into autumn. The
zucchinis didn't try to strangle us in our beds and I didn't have a huge
glut to split and give to the chooks.
We had the same lack of heat last year, with the same results.
http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article...729523/1033/ne
ws?Title=Grape-harvest-lagging

We did have a glut of Lebanese
cucumbers but I suspect that the reason why this happened is because they've
now self seeded themselves for a few years and so are used to our climate.
The fruit (prunes/plums, nectarines, peaches, apples, quinces and pears)
have all done brilliantly and we have had a bumper year to the poitn where
I'm sick of dealign with the harvest.
Sounds like winter is coming just in time ;O)

What did you learn? What will you do different next year?

Look after the trees better, get planting more veg earlier. Try to be more
organised and focus more at the right time of year.
I think we could all do well to write that in our gardening helmets
(hats).


It almost made me ill yesterday to be pulling potato plants out of the
bed in which they grew last year. I had no idea that potatoes could be
so invasive.

:-)) Yup. I've still got Purple Congo spuds coming up in a place where I
planted them at least 10 years ago.
The arugula and mustard are also tenacious hanger-oners. I finally was
able to stamp out the arugula, but I can accommodate a certain amount of
mustard to flavor the salads.


They have been moved to another bed that is less ideal, but
that is where they will remain. Growing so many varieties of Solanaceae
(potatoes, tomatoes, peppers) that it's difficult to get any kind of
crop rotation going.

Our tomatoes have germinated, as have the squash (zukes and crooks), and
brocolli. Peas are in the ground and we're about to plant more to fill
in one trellis and start another. Some of the peas have died. Not sure
if it's lack of water, or insects, but most are fine. Had our first
serving of Swiss chard. I think I over did it with my attempts to gussy
it up with bacon and onion.

Need to do some weeding today. It's mostly henbit. I'm hoping to make a
salad from some of the kill, along with dandelion and stinging nettle.
My other weeds are also mint (spear & pepper). They make my tisanes
(hawthorn, yarrow) taste more drinkable as I don't use honey.

I just like the mint on it's own in 'tea' form.
I do too. First I had mint tea "straight" was in a mosque's tea garden,
sitting in the shade on a warm day, but I need to drink my hawthorn and
milk thistle teas (still part of the European Pharmacopoeia), and the
dried stuff is not very alluring. The mint makes the experience more
inviting. I could drink it straight, but I'm supposed to keep my fluid
consumption down.

OK, who's next? Don't be bashful. We got a gardening group to run here,
right? ;O)

Well David and I can sit back and put our feet up and read our gardening
catalogues or chew the fat. You northern hemisphereans will be very busy.

Here's hoping you antipodaleans have a good rest, stay warm, and can
start planning your 2011 gardens.



OK, who's next? Tell us of your gardening hopes and dreams, your
failures and successes, and how you plan on dealing with them this year.
Don't be timid. What may seem to be a small thing to you, can be a big
thing to someone else.

We got a gardening group to run here, so step on up and keep it going.

"All gardeners know better than other gardeners."
- Chinese
right? ;O)
--
- Billy
Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. This is not a way of life at all in any true sense. Under the clouds of war, it is humanity hanging on a cross of iron.
- Dwight D. Eisenhower, 16 April 1953
http://www.allvoices.com/contributed-news/8559254-11yearold-takes-on-genetically-modified-food-producers-video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_vN0--mHug