The Fedco Seeds Catalog Is Here!

Last week, an early Christmas present arrived- the Fedco seeds catalog. If you're not familiar with Fedco, it's a small seed cooperative in Maine. They have amazing variety selections with low prices. I know this sounds like an advertisement but I don't know what I would do without Fedco. The catalog itself is a work of art with lots of timely, thought-provoking quotes and illustrations. The variety descriptions written by the company's founder C.R. Lawn are often funny and always interesting. The variety offerings range from those best suited for home gardeners to market gardening.

For those of us from Northern climes, the catalog emphasizes cold-hardiness with a large proportion of varieties that perform well with a short growing season.

Here is a link to a downloadable copy of their current catalog. In addition, here is a link to their online store.

Good Food Read: "Folks, this ain't normal" by Joel Salatin

At past PASA (Pennsylvania Association for Sustainable Agriculture)conferences, I've heard Joel Salatin speak on a variety of agricultural topics. It is about time that I read one of his books. This is a review of his most recent work "Folks, this ain't normal: A Farmer's Advice for Happier Hens, Healthier People, and a Better World."

Joel Salatin and his family own and operate Polyface Farm in Virginia's Shenandoah Valley, a diversified animal operation. Salatin is considered a pioneer in rotational grazing. This book is not a guide to his farming system but an intellectual exploration of range of farming and food issues. I may not agree with all of Salatin's politics but I enjoy reading what he has to say and thinking about it.

This is a book for contemplation. A great winter read after a long season of farming or gardening.

New York Times Features Community Gardens

Here are links to a recent series of articles from the New York Times on Community Gardens:

"The Seeds They Carried"

"Chickens Threaten to Divide Brooklyn Community"

"Growing Everything but Gardeners"

Recipe: Lemon Pepper Brussel Sprouts

Every Thanksgiving dinner, I use this recipe. The version I've written below is modified from Jack Bishop's "Vegetables Every Day" cookbook. This is the only recipe I use for brussel sprouts.

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Ingredients:

brussel sprouts, rinsed, trimmed, and cut in half

fresh lemon juice

olive oil

salt and pepper to taste

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Recipe:

Add the brussel sprouts to a pot of boiling water and cook for five minutes.

Drain immediately and sprinkle with lemon juice. The acid from the lemons will soften the harsh cabbage flavors. Typically, I use the juice from half of a lemon for a pound of brussel sprouts.

Toss with olive oil.

Season with salt and pepper.

Serve IMMEDIATELY. The lemon juice will discolor the sprouts if left sitting for too long.

Good Food Read: "Growing Older" by Joan Dye Gussow

Several years ago, I had read "This Organic Life: the Confessions of a Suburban Homesteader" by Joan Dye Gussow and absolutely loved reading it. A local organic farming conference stocked her newest book, "Growing Older", at their book sale. Being a frugal fanny, I jotted down the title and checked it out from my local library.

One of the most interesting aspects of the book is the author's description of coping with grief, or lack thereof, after the death of a loved one. It is fascinating to follow her thought process through her feelings of guilt because she isn't devastated by the loss of her husband.

The book is divided into four sections: The End of My Marriage, What Next?, Some of the Other Species, and Growing Older. My favorite chapters were "Muskrats, Dahlias, and an Italian", "Watery Lessons", and "Zucchini(Warning: Contains Recipes)." There is also a chapter discussing bees, pollinators, and colony collapse disorder.

Favorite quote included by the author:

"As long as one has a garden, one has a future. As long as one has a future, one is alive."

--Frances Hodgson Burnet, from "In the Garden"

Both books are available on Amazon and published by Chelsea Green Publishing in Vermont.

Recipe: Sauteed Swiss Chard

This fall, I've been using this recipe to quickly add a green vegetable to our dinners, especially when we need a break from salads. To extend our harvest, I left the swiss chard plants in the ground and included them in the low tunnel. For a variety suggestion, I've had success with 'Bright Lights' and haven't trialed any other varieties.

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Ingredients:

A bunch of eight to ten stalks of chard

1-2 tablespoons (15-30 mL) of olive oil

1/4 cup (50 g) finely minced onion

salt

pepper

lemon slices

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Recipe:

Remove the leaf material from the stems and place in a bowl of cool water. Meanwhile, chop the stems in 1/4 inch (0.75 cm) pieces. Combine the olive oil, chard stems, and onion in a large saute pan over medium high heat. Saute for about 5 minutes until the stems are tender.

Drain the leaves and remove most of the water. I suggest using a salad spinner. Add the leaves to the pan and cover.

After about 2.5 minutes, toss the swiss chard and cover again until thoroughly wilted, usually another 2.5 minutes. Season with salt and pepper.

Serve immediately with a lemon wedge. The lemon juice adds a nice acidic citrus flavor to the chard but will turn the rich green color into a muted brown if left to sit before serving.

Winter Low-Tunnel Timeline

Here is a timeline using photographs of the 2011-2012 winter garden. The beets, spinach, mache, and lettuce were seeded in late September. The garlic was planted in October. The carrots were seeded in late March.

Low-tunnels are easily constructed and require minimal investment compared to other winter growing options. Finally, part of the solution to eating locally year-round. The hoops are half inch diameter electrical conduit bent with a tool purchased from Johnny's Seeds. Electrical conduit is readily available at any local hardware or building supply store. The row cover (white fabric) is Agribon 19 and the plastic is Tufflite, both available at Johnny's Seeds. Typically, row cover will last two years. We've successfully re-used our row cover from last year for the current winter season. The manufacturer states that Tufflite greenhouse plastic will last five to seven years.

Key advice for setting-up the low-tunnels:

1. Have at least 3 ft of extra material at both ends. This allows one to ensure that the row cover and plastic are as taut as possible. If the row cover or plastic is sagging then rain and snow can collapse the low-tunnel. Pull the material into a pony-tail, twist, and secure with a sand bag. From the opposite end, repeat the same set of tasks with the addition of tightly pulling the row cover.

2. Find sturdy bags to fill with sand. Don't use zippered plastic bags. I had difficulty locating the feed bags that were recommended and resorted to using plastic storage bags. Those bags eventually split, even after careful handling.

September 28, 2011: Setting up the low tunnels.

January 6, 2012: Row cover and greenhouse plastic.

November 13, 2011: 'Tyee' and 'Bloomsdale' spinach seedlings.

Carrots

May 2, 2012: Carrot seedlings.

June 2, 2012: A snack from thinning the carrot patch.

July 10, 2012: Final carrot harvest.

Beets

March 11, 2012: The beet seedlings have survived the winter.

May 2, 2012: Transplanting of seedlings was successful!

June 2, 2012: Harvest of some luscious beets and beautiful beet greens

Garlic

March 11, 2012: 'Musik' and 'Chesnok Red' Garlic Varieties.

May 2, 2012: Still growing, by June 13th scapes were harvested from all of the plants.

Mighty Mache: the Champion of Winter Salad Greens

December 11, 2011: Seedlings!

January 6, 2012: Still growing, far right corner.

March 11, 2012: Ready to harvest.

Tips for a successful community garden plot

Two words: water and weeds.

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Depending on your community garden's set-up, watering your plants can be a time consuming and never-ending battle. In my experience, mulching deeply with 6-12 inches of straw will conserve a tremendous amount of water and reduce watering frequency.

If watering is not an issue, then weeds will likely take up most of your gardening time. Contrary to other gardeners with a loathing of weed pulling, I enjoy removing weeds but it takes time away from thinking about succession planting schedules, harvest plans, etc. Mulching at the aforementioned depth will also do a good job of suppressing weed seed germination.

Avoid underestimating the gardening time black hole of weedy pathways. There is nothing more frustrating then spending valuable time weeding the paths. The list of path weed control is almost endless: newspapers (not a fabulous solution), carpet remnants (These will work in my experience but eventually a determined weed will overcome the barrier), and straw. In regards to wood chips, check your garden bylaws because many gardens prohibit the use of wood chips. Landscape fabric is another viable option but do not cheap out, you will regret it later in the season.

If you decide not to mulch, the key to keeping weeds manageable is to remove weeds at the seedling stage. To cleanly remove the unwanted seedlings, slice the weeds just below the soil surface. This is important because many weed seeds occupy the first three inches of the soil stratum. Hoeing too deeply will bring these weed seeds closer to the surface where they can germinate and create havoc in your neatly tended garden beds.

Don't fall off the winter wagon- start seeding now for this winter

Extend your season and seed winter hardy vegetables now. Johnny's Selected Seeds has released their recommendations for varieties that are superior at overwintering. For instance, 'Nelson' carrots and 'Winter Density' lettuce were the best in their trials with unheated low tunnels. For more information, go here.

Last winter was the first year of my season extension experiment in Wisconsin. I will post results from last year very soon. Quick recommendations for superior winter greens crops would include mache, spinach, and arugula. If you've never heard of or tasted mache, it's time to try. Mache is an incredible winter green with a sweet flavor and buttery texture. However, be careful when Spring rolls around with 70F and above days. If you have warm days, harvest it immediately. But in the meantime, here are the crops and varieties that I will be growing this winter season.

Johnny's Seeds has some great, free low tunnel articles. For a more in-depth resource, I thoroughly enjoyed Eliot Coleman's new book, "The Winter Harvest Handbook", by Chelsea Green Publishing. It's available in print and as a kindle edition on Amazon.

The week of July 21

Carrots, 'Mokum', Fedco Seeds

Carrots, 'Red-Cored Chantenay', Fedco Seeds

Carrots, 'Shin Kuroda', Fedco Seeds

The week of August 7:

Yokatta-Na, Fedco Seeds

Kale, 'Red Russian', Seeds of Change

Dill, 'Fernleaf', Fedco Seeds

Cucumber, 'Poona Kheera', Fedco Seeds

Cucumber, 'Calypso', Fedco Seeds

Cucumber, 'Super Zagross', Fedco Seeds

Calendula, 'Resina', Fedco Seeds

Lettuce, 'Jericho', Fedco Seeds

The week of September 10:

Arugula (Rouqette), Fedco Seeds

Parsley, 'Krausa', Fedco Seeds

Mache, 'Verte de Cambrai', Fedco Seeds

Kale, 'Beedy's Camden', Fedco Seeds

Minutina, 'Erba Stella O', Fedco Seeds

The week of September 17:

It's the first day of the winter lettuce trial. All lettuce varieties are from Fedco Seeds in Waterville, ME.

'Winter Marvel'

'Red Salad Bowl'

'Salad Bowl'

'Cardinale Batavian'

'Jericho'

'Winter Wonderland'

'Lollo Rossa Cutting'

'North Pole'

'New Red Fire'

'Lingua Da Canarino'

'Red Tinged Winter'

Pest: The Birds

Birds can be helpful to a garden by eating insects. However, in my experience, birds will do more harm than good. I've lost an entire set of transplants to some hungry birds. Anytime the garden has seedlings, either from a direct sowing or transplanting, I use wire hoops and wildlife netting to protect the plants. I will leave this netting in place until the plants reach the height of the netting. Usually, once the seedlings reach an adequate size, the birds will no longer clip leaves. This year is a bit different. My neighbor has a wonderful garden with lots of bird feeders. I truly appreciate all of the wildlife, however, several species have an affection for my small Swiss chard planting. I took these pictures to document my Swiss chard bird feeder. As the chard leaves increase in size, the stem gracefully arcs and provides an ideal perch for their snacking.

Community Gardens, ooh la la

What is a community garden?

Community gardens are run by organizations, groups,or individuals who have access to publicly or privately owned tracts of land. The land is divided into small plots, typically between 300 to 500 square ft, that is leased for a season to individuals or families in the community. Most community gardens have one or more volunteer committees that help to organize and maintain the garden. Usually, volunteer service hours are expected or required to maintain the pathways, tool sheds, and watering areas.

What to consider when joining a community garden:

How close is the garden to your house or workplace?

What facilities are provided? e.g. water source, tool shed

Are any gardening supplies included? e.g. compost delivery on-site, seed or plant donations

Is there a work requirement?

What is the cost for a season and is there a deposit?

How large is the plot? Will it be adequate for the crops that you want to grow?

Are there any planting restrictions? For instance, many community gardens prohibit planting of perennials because of high turn-over of plots and aggressive plants such as bronze fennel, mint, etc.

Benefits of Joining a Community Garden

It's about COMMUNITY. If you've just moved into the area, joining a community garden is a great way to meet other gardeners, learn what grows well, and hear about pest issues specific to the garden.

The joys and tribulations of growing your own food.

Preserving the harvest for the winter.

Donating extra produce and every gardener has a bumper crop of at least one vegetable.

And most of all, if you don't have access to land, this is your ticket to gardening.

Technique: Harvesting salad greens that stay fresh longer

Materials: sharp knife, plastic container, cool water, salad spinner, storage container or bag.

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How to harvest salad greens: 1. Use a sharp knife or scissors. I prefer a sharpened knife. Scissors can have a tendency to crush the leaf tissue, which can hasten rot. If harvesting head lettuce, cut at the soil level and remove yellowed or dead leaves. If harvesting salad mix, cut a few inches above the soil. 2. Put the harvested greens directly into a bowl, tub, or bucket of cool water. This cools the leaf tissue and prevents wilting. Also, this step allows slugs, sand, and dirt to fall to the bottom while insects and spiders to rise to the top. 3. Use a salad spinner to remove the excess water. 4. Store in a plastic bag or plastic ware. If using a plastic bag, be careful not to crush the greens in the bag.

What not to do: clench or crush greens in a bundle, this will bruise the leaf blades or midribs and will significantly shorten the shelf-life.

Cooking from the Garden

I'm always searching for new vegetable preparation recipes. One of my favorite things to do in the evening is to walk out into the garden and harvest today's dinner. For many years, I either worked for an organic vegetable farm, purchased a veggie share from a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program at a local farm, or grew an abundance of vegetables. At first, I had no idea to prepare some of the vegetables that I had helped to harvest for the farm's weekly CSA pick-up. It was a very worthwhile investment to purchase some vegetable oriented cookbooks.

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The List

Author	Title
Jack Bishop	Vegetables Every Day
Mary Beth Lind and Cathleen Hockman-Wert	Simply in Season
Madison Area Community Supported Agriculture Coalition	From Asparagus to Zucchini: a Guide to Cooking Farm-fresh Seasonal Produce

Winter Vegetable Production

Growing salad greens, leeks, carrots, and beets through a Wisconsin winter? Yes, it is possible. And, no, this isn't new. We are talking about season extension. Eliot Coleman, in his most recent book, "The Winter Harvest Handbook", provides an excellent review of season extension's history. French market gardeners, particularly in urban settings, have been blending seasons to extend the harvest for at least a century.

Why did I choose to embark on a winter gardening adventure? First, I have a passion for growing delicious vegetables and am committed to eating food that is produced locally. Need help going local? Check out this website to find your "Buy Fresh Buy Local" chapter. Second, I have always been fascinated with the art and science of season extension.

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Supplies:

Agribon 19 row cover, 10 ft. wide, available at Johnny's Selected Seeds

Electrical conduit, 10 ft. length, 1/2 in. diameter

QuickHoops bender, available at Johnny's Selected Seeds

Tufflite greenhouse plastic, 10 ft. wide, available at Johnny's Selected Seeds

Sand

Sand bags or small feed bags available in feed and farm stores

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Sources of information:

"Season Extension with Low Tunnels" article, written by Jean English at MOFGA, from Eliot Coleman's workshop.

Four Season Farm's website, owned and operated by Barbara Damrosch and Eliot Coleman, has lots of information on their publications, resources, and suppliers

Growing cool, crisp salad greens mid-summer, is it an oxymoron?

What do you want to eat when you want to beat the heat? Well, I want a gigantic, cooling, salad fresh from the garden.

Generally, lettuce and salad greens tend to become bitter when days heat up beyond 90 degrees Fahrenheit and rain is a memory of spring. However, don't despair, a lush salad in July may be in your future.

These are my suggestions: choose heat-tolerant varieties, mulch with 6-8 inches of straw to conserve moisture, and irrigate. Johnny's seeds has an excellent selection of heat-tolerant lettuce varieties. Although, as a general rule, I avoid planting any butterhead types during the heat of summer. If irrigating mulched, heat-tolerant varieties isn't working for you, there is another tactic- shade cloth. An excellent, local garden store may have small sections of shade cloth for sale.

Beyond the realm of lettuce and spinach is perpetual spinach. This tough but tender green will stand up to the mid-summer heat without becoming bitter or rushing to flower, otherwise known as bolting. Cornell University has some great cultivation information. Fedco sells seeds for a reasonable price plus they have the most informative and entertaining variety descriptions in their catalog.

The delight of gardening

The moments when you are reminded of gardening's joys: yanking weeds, trellising tomatoes, smashing cucumber beetles between your fingers, and the blissful sound of water gushing through a rainwand. This past week has been an absolute scorcher in Wisconsin. I can't remember the last time we had rain. Typically, I work in the garden despite the heat but the one hundred degree temperatures sent me inside.

The cucumbers, butternut squash, sunflowers, and tomatoes have loved the heat. Finally, last night, the heat wave abated and we determinedly went to our community garden plot to trellis tomatoes and combat nasty voles. This summer, it has been an epic battle in a rodent-infested community garden. Two weeks ago, our absolutely gorgeous eight-inch tall 'Shirofumi' edible soybeans, also known as edamame, were clipped to the ground by several hideously obese voles. We had an extensive network of wildlife netting, firmly secured with landscape staples, that proved completely ineffective against the repeated onslaught of hungry rodents. This week, a rabbit had a lovely meal of 'Midnight Black Turtle' bean plants. Somehow, the 'Sarian' strawberry plants, that I started from seed in February, have escaped unscathed.

On a lighter note, this week's harvest: two 'Eight Ball' zucchini fruits, a handful of 'Red Norland' potatoes, several 'Poona Kheera' cucumbers, and a 'Calypso' pickling cucumber. Other veggies that were ready to harvest include: 'Beedy's Camden' kale, immature onions, swiss chard, young 'Ventura' celery stalks, Verbena bonariensis flowers, and 'Red-Cored Chantenay' and 'Shin Kuroda' carrots.

In the garden. . .

Beets, oh glorious beets! The seeds were sown on October 15, 2011, germinated in the fall, and survived the winter. I transplanted the seedlings to another section of the garden this spring and harvested them on June 2. I modified a recipe from America's Test Kitchen for the beet greens and used my favorite beet recipe from Jack Bishop's "Vegetables Every Day." The gist of the recipe is to use oven roasted beets, slip off the skins once the beets have cooled, and cut into 1/4 inch slices. I use a pie plate to combine some olive oil, lemon juice, salt, and pepper with a whisk or just pick up the pie plate and swirl it around. I add the beets and top with chopped parsley and kalamata olives. The perfect summer beet salad!

The carrots, sowing date March 21, needed to be thinned. I planted three different varieties, all from Fedco Seeds, by the way an absolutely amazing seed company in Maine, 'Mokum', 'Red-cored Chantenay', and 'Shin Kuroda'. I observed the fastest germination and top growth for the 'Mokum' variety. The photo shows thinnings of the 'Red-cored Chantenay' and 'Shin Kuroda'. I had already thinned the 'Mokum' seedlings and just harvested some fabulous, luscious, early carrots yesterday, June 9. The taste of home-grown carrots is amazing. Grocery store carrot flavor is just a mere shadow of a garden carrot's along with differences in texture and knowing how that carrot was grown.

Garden failure/re-purposing of the week- I planted two white turnip varieties similar to the 'Hakurei' type on April 7, between two rows of trellised peas. The germination rate was great and I thinned the seedlings. However, the roots were lackluster, small, dry, and hairy. I ripped them all out and used the turnip greens. The poor, blighted roots are still languishing in my refrigerator.

Winter gardening in Wisconsin?

Since I walked into a minimally heated greenhouse, absolutely bursting with winter greens, in mid-February, I have wanted to grow in the winter. This wasn't a Georgia greenhouse, it was at Hampshire College's Farm Center in Western Massachusetts. Greens grown in the winter have deep flavor.

After several salads of deliciously crisp, sweet claytonia, mache, and mizuna, I started by reading several of Eliot Coleman's books. Cold frames were too expensive for a college student's budget and required tools along with skilled hands. I didn't have those ingredients. Several years later, in graduate school, a small greens patch in my community garden plot went through a zone 5 winter with a double layer of row cover. Then, I learned about unheated low tunnels on Johnny's Seeds website. Again, the crafty, wily, inventive Eliot Coleman had a solution. I found an article about a low tunnel workshop given at the Maine Organic Farmers and Gardener's Association annual event, The Common Ground Fair. This was it- low tech, minimal investment.

Top, Tat-soi and arugula on December 11, 2011; Middle, Spinach, lettuce mix, and mache on January 6, 2012; Bottom, 'Tyee' and 'Bloomsdale Long Standing' spinach on March 20, 2012