Getting photos for the fair

Having a rare Sunday off, I took off for the afternoon and decided to check out the scenery around Dalton Gardens and Hayden, Idaho. The reason: Fair photos. I am getting a collection together for the North Idaho Fair this year and angling to buy a photo printer that I can attach to the old laptop and print out the ones I plan on taking. A type of "Photoshop" program, "Picture this" that is Microsoft's version of Picassa. But unlike Picassa, you can add shapes. So, deciding on the desire to enter at least one manipulated to its silliest and a second one made black and white on the laptop, I tweaked and played around with the photos I plan on taking. The one I have here, I don't think I doctored.

In gardening news, having set up my large greenhouse/cold frame in order to house my 24 each, eggplants, tomatoes and peppers; the smaller built in shelf green house was simply getting too crowded as the plants got taller. So now they are sitting, eggplants and tomatoes, on plant stands with boards stretched between them. The peppers crowd the shelves of a coverless greenhouse. I plan on building covers for the tiered greenhouses by fall and place one in the giant "cold frame." The built in shelf greenhouse will be rebuilt and then covered in the fall and placed near the back door. That way, I can simply walk my seed flats out to it by February. The FarmTek sales people suggesting making double covers. I have a cover for the large "cold frame" already and need only get it on by September. The tier greenhouse that I plan to park in the "coldframe" will get a single cover with a roll up door. A second tier greenhouse will get a double cover and a doubled roll up door. (I don't do zippers.) The third tier greenhouse that I plan to store plants in between treks to the Farmer's Market won't get one since after May the likelihood of frost begins to diminish drastically. The built in shelves greenhouse will get a double cover and a roll up door too. Having used about a third of the 180 foot roll of greenhouse film, I am certain that I shall have enough plastic to take care of what is necessary.

At least my tomatoes are blooming in the middle of July after having been started the first of May. Hot house tomatoes, they did better "under cover" for having been planted so late than if they have been planted out in the back garden.

We had a wicked wind blow through the inland Northwest last Thursday, picked up some hot blazes over in Washington state and tumbled my peppers and some of my eggplants. Must have been blowing around 60 mph. Much like a Santa Ana wind. Didn't lose any eggplants, but did see a loss of some of the peppers. One snapped off below the crown but will regrow. Couldn't ressurrect the seedling that had been recently planted. Another one had also snapped off near the base. I bought a pepper and having two to spare of my own, planted them as well. So, it takes time for young peppers to get big enough to begin bearing. But "under cover," they will have to the end of the Market to produce. So in that dept at least, hope springs eternal.

Middle of June, a garden.

I have successfully potted and boxed a working garden up on my deck. Pumpkins, gourds, winter and summer squash, an herb garden, some cucumbers, and cutting flowers. I have my fair projects: Peppers, herbs, tomatoes, and an eggplant. I put together an area for my Farmer's Market tomatoes, peppers and eggplants: I resurrected a built-in-shelves green house that had literally broken down over winter and arranged my pots of the above on it. I also added a "plant stand" or mini green house to put peppers, fair project herb garden, and a fair project herb in it. I covered the whole shebang in plastic. But, only just enough for frost and deer protection, but not so much so that the peppers, eggplants and tomatoes won't get the breezes necessary for fertilization. Between Tuesday afternoon and again on Thursday, I have rototilled my garden out back and planted corn seed as well as soybeans and pumpkins. Because my onion seed did not grow in the first plot when planted in May, I retilled that and planted Indian corn, pumpkin seed and last year's melon seed. Hard to know if it will grow. Still a spot left to put out excess tomatoes and eggplants that don't sell as plants. But, I'll have to cage these to try to keep the deer off. So this year, I'll have a garden to work with.

Doing something different.

The deer had become such a problem in the last 2 years that they have been very prone to chewing up just about everything that gets planted in the garden. Given that I don't want valuable business investments to go the way of deer fodder, I have taken to planting a container garden again this year. Much of it is now generally sprouting on the deck of my house, the rest I am putting up on plant stands and covering in plastic to keep out the beasties. At least I am gardening again. And have planted much of the garden I am going to have already.

In other news, the Farmer's Market of Kootenai County has been going strong now since before Mother's day. On the first day of the market, (red face here) I had one flat of plants that got dug out of the yard and our flower bed. That's because the seeds I had finally gotten to plant in the garage had barely come up and weren't yet ready to sell. My legitimate whine was, that February then March was too cold to try to plant anything. Then April came and with it wild swings in weather. So it wasn't before May that I could finally get something in the flats and put it under lights. Mostly, I was planting peppers, tomatoes and eggplants for sale as produce plants later in the year. When I got the plants I wanted for my container garden, then and only then would I try selling the excess. But herbs and flowers would be potted for sale and those are now coming along beautifully.

Got an exotic herb out of one of my seed catalogs this year, it is called Ajwain. I believe I got it from Ecoseed and Ajwain is described as an herb where you can use its leaf in sandwiches and its seed in Curry. So, Ajwain from E. India is the new spice herb. It goes over well, I'll get it again.

Starting anew on container gardening.

I began ordering my seeds for my new garden since December and planted the first of them on the first of January 2008. Tomatoes have come up first and are now starting to put out their first true leaves. I am still waiting for the peppers to sprout, it seems to take them longer to actually get going. One thing I have noticed about the daylight bulbs I installed last year, the tomatoes are not long and spindly for lack of light. I also managed to save one pepper from last year. Wow, one pepper. The others had wilted and died off completely. So, I'll keep this pepper going and put it out with my new plants in the spring.

Because of the deer problem I am completely reorganizing how I garden. Some of what I plant will go in a cold frame, lettuces and greens, carrots and radishes. I certainly have enough stuff on hand to build it and create something of a raised garden in my garden. For other veggies that don't do so well in containers, such as beans, I'll put out tomato cages and twine to keep the deer from munching my produce as severely.

Of everything else, I can easily pre-start corn, cukes, zukes, winter squash, pumpkins and gourds. Companion planting corn and vining veggies, putting wire cages and twine in strategic places, and hopefully it will keep the deer and their predations off of the garden somewhat. So here is good luck to my next Farmer's Market Garden.

First of January

I have put together a container garden in my basement. It comprises tomatoes and peppers initially with two kinds of eggplants to follow. One of those peppers and a tomato will eventually become Kootenai County Fair submissions. Why plant so soon? I want to have produce for sale at the beginning of the new market this year. It need not be until February before I start planting the plants I want for sale. Tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, flowers among other goodies. By April, I should expect to set up containers and put them under a cold frame for lettuce and other greens. It doesn't take long for them to grow. I plan on a new and productive garden this year that I can take down to the market.