County Fair 2014

Grand Champion garden box at the Waushara County Fair, 2014

Well, it is end of the summer signaled here in Waushara County by the county fair.  It is also the 100th anniversary of 4-H in Wisconsin.  Although the motto is "100 years and going strong,"  I feel that may be wishful thinking on the part of the state organization.  To my eyes, it appeared there were a lot fewer entries this year over last in junior and open classes.  It may be the 4-Hers' priorities are more appropriately set on service projects of which I do not hear across the county, but I do not know if that is truly the case.

Zinnias on display backed by a pink geranium, the colors of summer on display.

Progress of the Family Vegetable Garden

Last year, my 'Honeycrisp' was loaded with bloom.  This year not a single blossom.  The crabapples and wild apples around me have blosssoms, as well as the probably 150 year old apple tree at the historic house of my brother.  On further investigation, at the tips where I would expect a blossom are tiny dead dry dots which fall off easily when I touch them.  My blossom buds from that night in April when the temperatures fell to somewhere around 9-12 degrees (F).

We like to make a lot of sauce, juice, and sliced apples and can them as a family.

Planting the Small Garden in Central Wisconsin

Four trays on the top shelf of my grow rack filled with seedlings fro transplant

Choosing the best varieties, for me, is part seed saving, part experience, and part leg work.  I have been talking to truck farmers, market growers, and checking out the winning varieties at the local county fairs for a few years now.  My goal in seed saving is develop cultivars with provenance, that sense of place, cultivars that will grow well no matter what Mother Nature hands us.

By talking with other growers and checking out the county fairs, I am attempting to cut down my research time frame and develop some good knowledge for local growers.  Here in central Wisconsin we live in a unique horticultural climate bounded by gardening extremes.  I don't want tomatoes in the hot year, I want them every year.  Same for peppers, potatoes, lettuce, and broccoli.

Over the past few years I have started to develop some favorites.

My seedlings are typically a bit larger, but this year, I didn't start many until March 15, including the annual flower transplants.  As spring is slow in coming this year, I am not particularly concerned that I will be late.

Sweet Peppers:

Surprisingly 'California Wonders' are the best bell peppers with the best probability they will get red, even in a short growing season.  They are sometimes marketed under some other names like 'King Arthur'. Also surprisingly, they seem to come true from seed, although they are F1 hybrids.  I have not noticed a difference over seed collected over the course of a number of years.  Additionally, the saved seed germinates at nearly 90 percent.  I wish I could say the same for the pricey purchased seed of new cultivars I would like to try.  As an added kicker the purchased seed sometimes runs 50 cents a seed, for seed that does not reliably germinate.

Pimento Peppers:

'Sheepnose', by and far, is the meatiest of these pimentos I have tried.

Other peppers:

Peppers are an interesting group.  They are super easy to wash, slice up, and freeze.  You can dry them.  I use them in a wide variety of foods from stir frys to fajitas and soups.  Surprisingly, seed saved at almost any stage of harvest will germinate-- whether it is a red pepper or a potentially red pepper harvested green.  All the mumbo-jumbo about hybrid seed does not seem as rigid with peppers either, which means you have a really tasty grocery store pepper, by all means save the seed and try and grow it.  I have had good luck growing  peppers from saving the seed from the nearly seedless roasting peppers you see in supermarkets for tail-gating coming football season.

Tomatoes:

Well, there are these, and this...

Beans:

When it comes to green beans, I will admit I wasn't a fan...until beautiful SIL made her gluten-free green bean casserole.  I will say I planted a short row of 'Fortex' last spring and they were incredible.  Even just blanched and frozen and then heated in a microwave these were really good.  Previously I have grown some other beans, like kidney beans and white northern, primarily to use as dried beans.   The white northern were a pain to shell which had to be almost completely done pain-stakingly by hand, while the kidney beans could have been beaten and shook loose fairly easily.  I have also grown some of the white and red mottled bean of the dragon tongue type, beautiful mottled red pods on smallish plants, singles this bean out for use in a well-designed decorative garden space for edible landscaping.

Onions:

I have struggled with onions.  First off, I like them fresh, like as scallions.  Second I would like some good storing onions. I also, because I like onions, am a fan of all the nuances the right onion can add to any dish.  Unfortunately, central Wisconsin is a long day length onion growing zone.  Most of what is sold here are onion sets, which certainly seem to not actually set onions of much size at all.  They certainly don't have the nuances that a sweet Spanish yellow can impart to a dish or even the flavor of a Vidalia.  Both of these are short day length onions and will not grow very well here.  For flavor and storing potential 'Alisa Craig' seems to have the lock.  The only way to grow them is to start your own from seed.  Some of the Asian onions will do well to grow as scallions, and grow fairly quickly.  I have tried the flat, red Cibolla types here and they were okay although only about two inches in diameter.  Onions do germinate fairly well from seed, so if there is a variety that is a favorite I do encourage you to start your own sets sometime in the end of February.

Next Post: Salad greens and peas...

A Garden Sense of Home: What's on Your Plate?

(Photo: www.softpedia.com)

Mother Nature is seriously messing with us.  I suppose she feels we (people) have it coming.  Gardeners are just the collateral damage.

Overnight the rain turned to snow.  It is a heavy snow, but it doesn't appear it is primarily  sleet clinging to the needles of my white pine and various shrubs, so that's all to the good.  The last couple years with the fits and starts between winter and spring, we have had a couple bad ice storms which knocked down power lines and brought down huge branches from my monumental white pine, bouncing them off my tiny hobbit home like it was the backstop on a baseball field for an angry pitcher told to practice.

Ice storms so bad, you remember the dates; last year's on April 10, two years ago on April 12.

Conversations, though, are turning to gardening.  Even among the eaters, who have benefited from my gardening without the work input required.  "Eat local, know your farmer."  For them, I am that, their source of local produce.  Seems beautiful sister-in-law (SIL)has been sharing the wealth, without leaking that information up, or down," the food chain."

Waushara County Fair 2012 Vegetable Round Up

(This is the Open Class winner for best garden box.)

Each year I go to the county fair and take special note of those vegetables which the judges award blue ribbons.

Last year, 'Celebrity' tomatoes were hands down the big winner in a wet and cool summer. This year, nary a single plate of 'Celebrity' showed up. I think I know why. They may like it cool and wet, but in hot dry conditions they are subject to cracking shoulders and blossom end rot. Oh, I know the blossom end rot thing has to do with seedling's tiny root hairs drying out and thus limiting the uptake of calcium; however, I feel some tomatoes are just prone to that. Meanwhile, in the family garden, the heirloom 'Olpaka' keeps on keeping on. This is the bread and butter, the meat and potatoes, of all our summer sauces, salsas, and sun-dried tomatoes. It is a Roma-style tomato and has done well in hot (that should be underscored and bolded) and dry years. And, last year while we prepared to be swept away by flood did equally as well.

This year's red tomato county fair winner was 'Big Beef'.

I try and make special note of any winners of vegetable I don't grow that maybe I should or vegetable varieties which I seem to have a hard time growing. Onions is one of these I can't seem to get to any size, no matter how much research into day length varieties I do and best onions for our area. It seems the winners jump around from year to year, too.

This year the blue ribbon in Open Class went to 'Savannah Sweet', a short day variety. Now, I'm clueless, because supposedly we are supposed to be growing long day varieties here in central Wisconsin.

I entered the summer squash category and mine got 4th. Getting a ribbon of any type in Open Class is all good. The winner and I both grew the same variety to the same size, but mine growing where I grow them, always have these bumps, obviously the winner should not.

This is one entry that totally amazed me. I didn't think 'Hungarian Wax' peppers turned red.

This year, was, I think, a poor year for sweet corn.



The winner was 'Ambrosia'.

There was no amaranth or edamame on display. No one entered any blue potatoes, which have done so well for us in the family garden, as to make my brother comment we should skip the white potatoes because of their attraction for the Colorado potato beetles, versus the blue ones which were nearly pest free in our non-pesticidal, no Spinosad garden.

No one ventured too far outside the "garden box" to enter golden beets or seedless grapes (We grow 'Reliance'.)

The two grand champions of the vegetables this year were a humongous watermelon and in a year where I have heard garlic did poorly from many people, this plate of garlic.



Tomorrow, I review what was in those garden boxes; what is supposedly the best variety and specimens your garden has to offer.

Squirreling It Away

The huge tomato Amana Orange ready to eat. I'm thinking this looks like a breakfast tomato!

There is so much food in the garden right now, and the tomatoes have not kicked in. Yes, I had a handful of those small grapette tomatoes that adopted my shrub border. Yesterday, two of the first Amana Orange heirlooms were ripe. Bushels of tomatoes, no not yet. Still it is time to kick it into "squirrel mode".

I have a few jars of blackberries and strawberries that I froze as whole berries and then tumbled into can and freeze jars. Today thin slices of green pepper joined them in the icy darkness in the top of my freezer. Freezing green peppers is one of the easiest preserving things the home gardener can do. Literally, wash, slice them up thinking of how you will use them. If you are going to add them chopped to a sauce, chop them. If you will ad them to fajitas or Philly cheese steak sandwiches, slice them up long and thin. Portion them into the amounts you typically use when cooking your dish, and freeze them. That's all there is to it. No need to blanch them.

During the school year, I eat a lot of soup for lunch and one of my favorites is a chicken corn chowder. I found a recipe for drying sweet corn and a recipe for a chicken corn chowder using this dried sweet corn as its base ingredient in an older English canning and preserving book, Perfect Preserves, by Nora Carey.

Here is my attempt at drying the kernels. I'm about 3/4 of the way there. This drying recipe involves cutting the corn from the cob without blanching and then mixing it with a bit of salt, sugar, and heavy cream. The corn is then dried in a 200 degree oven.

I'm looking for recipes for drying, oiling, and canning my harvest as freezer space is at a premium this year.

One of the plants we grew last year was Aunt Molly's cape gooseberries. The seed was a give away from Jung's in addition to purchase. I started the seed when I started my tomatoes and transplanted 12 seedlings into the garden only to have them kill to the ground from the May 26, 2011 hard freeze. Four of them bounced back and provided just enough of the sweet berry like fruit for a taste; the Twins claiming this fruiting annual for their own and renaming it "tomato berries". They learned how to find the ripe berries versus the not-so-ripe, and how to husk them. They would sit right down next to the plants and harvest everything edible on every trip to the garden, leaving very little with which to play with in recipes and none to preserve.

This year, I planted 25 plants from seed harvested from those plants. They have grown into big heavy plants 40" wide and covered with fruit. My Handsome Son helping me harvest yesterday said, "Mom, you've got TOO MANY tomato berries!" The Twins are at the Dells at a waterpark, and with even 25 plants this is the first I have gotten of the fruit.

We picked everything that had fallen from the plants. When they are ripe you can gently lift the plants and shake gently. If it doesn't fall off it is not really ripe. The outer husk protect the fruit and they can easily be scooped up. A much easier system than attempting to pick them near ripeness from the closely connected stem and vine.

Husking them is quick and my box easily yielded a quart of clean fruit. I am going to attempt to dry them like a raisin and use in cookies or oatmeal. Last year, I put a handful of them cut in half in the dehydrator. Cut in half they were too small to be worth the time scraping them off the dehydrator racks. This year I placed them in my oven (with a standing pilot) at 200 degrees for an hour and then turned off the oven. We'll see how that works. I'd like to have about six quarts of dried golden berries (their "new" organic marketing promotional name) for my use through the winter. We'll see how that jibes with the Twins' appetites!

The other plant creating quite a stir to visitors in the family garden is golden amaranth. I planted this "grain" (It is not really a grain, although used like one.) as a non-gluten flour substitute. My gluten-intolerant sister-in-law spends a lot of money for pricey flour substitutes. She would really like to use quinoa, but we are too far north to expect a reliable harvest. Studies have not gotten quinoa to flower in Minneapolis, a good equivalent for our climate here. Without flowering there is no harvest. So quinoa is not the grain for us.

Enter amaranth.

Amaranth can be used for pancakes and biscuits and puffed and made into energy bars and cereals. The puffing process is similar to popping popcorn the old-fashioned way. I decided amaranth might be the grain for us. Not knowing what to expect, I planted the seed pretty thickly. Incredibly, I think every seed germinated! Not wanting to thin it out, one of my twin nephews and I dug up a 4 foot section of the row and replanted half the seedling 10" over when they were about 4" tall. Okay, this is me and a 3-year-old. He wanted to be involved and planted every plant. I don't think we killed a single plantling. The plants are about a foot or so shorter at this point, but our transplant experiment was a success.

The amaranth has received no fertilizers, has been grown organically. Yesterday, it was taller than my head thanks to my brother's timely watering through the season. Watering aside, the amaranth will head out even in drought conditions. Each plant can produce 1/2 to 1 pound of seed, which is the grain.

Cleaned this seed goes for as much as $12 a pound, internet, or health food stores. I figure we have 200 plants all developing seed heads. This might be a serious cash crop for us, if we can find an outlet. If nothing else, it could be a top dressing for the donkeys!

I am not the only one thinking of squirreling away food. The squirrels have actually attacked my hazelnuts, actually sitting in one of my garden chairs to enjoy their repast!

On my way home I saw one of the big CAFOs harvesting for green chop (possible ensilage) into big semis(like 10 or 12, maybe more) a 60-acre field of irrigated corn.

This is corn that even with the heat and drought looks fantastic. Planted thickly, because irrigation was part of Plan A, not back-up Plan B, this is corn that would have beautiful ears. Ears that might bring $10-12 a bushel later this winter. Irrigated and thickly planted corn that might make 240 bushels to an acre...

I'll do the math for you. At $10 a bushel, that's a field's harvest worth $144,000. And, it is being green-chopped. Now. Because there is more food value with the growing stalks than the value of the fall crop. Because someone has to feed a HUGE herd of cows. Because there is NO hay...

I don't where this is going, but my dad is also making some hard decisions. Selling dairy animals with great bloodlines before they are even bred, for MEAT, not as replacement dairy animals. Likewise, his decision to borrow money to buy hay, now when hay can be found to buy, and stockpiling it, figuring the price increase in hay and the milk it can produce will cover the interest it will cost to borrow the money. Because, even at 80, he doesn't want to liquidate his herd. A herd that has the employment of 5 1/2 people riding on its continuation.

Yes, milk is a trickle-down economy, in the truest sense of the word.

So make like a squirrel.

Bountiful Garden, Yours in Exchange for a Freezer

The family garden is fulfilling its promise. My brother with his growing family (three boys three and under) and myself and Handsome Son (college-bound), and nominally my parents will all eat from its bounty. My brother has been diligent in his role of chief waterer, an important job this year, to which he has really stepped up.

I'm the grower, and I have been notably successful with everything this year except germination in the garden of spinach (but we will be having a fall crop, rest assured!).

Even with eating fresh from the garden everyday, and my canning and drying and putting up different oils, a lot of our bounty will be frozen. I have hunted recipes for edamame and amaranth. We have a juicer for the grapes. We are already out of freezer space. Time to get a second freezer.

So my brother and I have decided as the family garden is actually visible from a major highway (car count of at least 10,000 car a day, probably a LOT more) with an exit right THERE, that we should sell our bounty, picking it literally in front of our customers' eyes. We take that money and buy whatever sort of freezer we can afford. Future income a better water supply (rather than hoses from the house) and a green house (drool).

My brother, very pie-in-the-sky, decided instead of words we should paint pictures, a picture being worth a thousand words. Pictures with the crunch of a fresh cucumber, the snap of a bean, the juiciness of a tomato...

My brother is a fair artist. An oil he did of his wife hangs in her dressing room. You can see the love with which he captured her expression and you can easily see it is my sister-in-law, but...

So, "Yo!"

"You painting these pictures?" I query.

"No,...I'm just a hack... you are. You have more time."

Ugh. Thusly decided, I was given the job of painting the sign(s). Turns out we need lots of these 10" x 3' sign blanks painted with sweet corn, cukes, peppers, beans, you get the idea.

I wish I had pictures of the others. As my sister-in-law says, "they are so dang cute!"

Maybe I'll take some pictures of the others, I don't know. I spent some time working for a muralist. They are sorta cute, without faces you understand, and easily conveying at 65+ MPH that "we got some good organic tomatoes over here!"

Maybe in a different life I might have made a living doing art or writing, but do you know anyone who really makes a living from their art or words these days?

Faithful Companion, Cinnamon, gets aromatherapy from Handsome Son's athletic shoes and flip flops. She says a few minutes and all the creative impulses pass.

Fused glass buttons, pendants and a dragonfly plate I made in a fused glass class I recently took from the artist of Blessings Glassworks.

Some jewelry I made. You can probably tell I'm self-taught!

A wire-wrapped bead collection that will go into an as yet,unfinished bracelet. Someday the creative impulse will certainly pass!

So if you see the juicy tomato or crunchy cucumber sign, stop and say hi!

Postcard from the Family Garden

Cabbage 'Red Acre' and sage

'yum Yum' pepper

'California Wonder' pepper

Amaranth

Sweet corn 'Early Sunglow'

Amaranth

Leaf lettuce mix

Pineapple sage


Cucumbers and tomatoes

'Contender' beans

Potatoes and tomatoes

Sweet potatoes

Turnip greens

Mizuna

P.S. Wish you were here! It would beat a lousy t-shirt!

Choosing Tomatoes for Central Wisconsin

My tomato seedlings last spring on April 5, 2012. I think I started them March 1. See how big they were on April 5? They would not get transplanted outdoors until the end of May, two months later.


Typically, I start my tomatoes on March 15. I am always itching to start them sooner, but experience has shown me that to do so invites disaster to your garden plan. They just get too big before I feel any safety setting them out into the unforgiving climate of central Wisconsin.

There are a few annuals, I might start before, or some unusual veggies (two years now I have attempted artichokes, not to have a single one germinate!) But peppers, followed by tomatoes, basil, and eggplant, and then tomatoes is pretty much the way I roll.

Not this year.

Yesterday was another beautiful day. I couldn't help it. I put out some red onion sets, planted a small patch of lettuce, and planted a couple rows of peas.

I planted some outdoor cool season crops BEFORE I planted my tomato transplants.

Last year, we had a great tomato crop. More than enough for canning, eating, freezing drying; it was a successful season. I was worried. There was a lot of rain, I kept thinking we would have blight. We didn't. It was not particularly warm, but August was nice, not a lot of rain, enough. Not a lot of heat, but the overnight temperatures were above 50 degrees (F), the daytime temperatures above 70.

Last year, I planted all the tomato seed I had saved for a number of years. The newer seed, as you would expect sprouted much more reliably than older seed, but I did get some from all my seed packets.

Last year, I chose 'Siberian', 'Bloody Butcher', 'Sweet 100', "Roma', and 'Olpaka'.

A popular tomato grown successfully last year in this area was 'Celebrity' as evidenced by the blue ribbon entries at the county fair.



I saved seed from last year. I purchased some 'Celebrity' hybrid seed and 'Better Boy', as well. I also missed having any golden, low acid tomatoes and thought it might be fun to dry some for their beautiful golden color to add to an oil along with basil and garlic for pizza and for a sweet jelly. I chose 'Taxi' and a tomato called 'Amana Orange'.
'Taxi' is a small 1 1/2" round, yellow tomato.

As for 'Amana Orange', Tomatofest says, "Huge heirloom beefsteak tomato named for the Amana Colonies in Iowa. These organic tomato seeds produce big, regular leaf plants that produce above average amounts of beautiful light-orange, irregular shaped (fluted) heirloom tomatoes that can grow to 2 pounds or more, with an average diameter of 5 inches. Excellent sweet, almost tropical fruit flavors. This tomato variety has been included in my tomato garden for more than 20 years. A winner!"


At 90 days from transplant, I might not see a lot of fruit, but the promise of a large tropical-flavored fruit convinced me.

Yesterday, I picked up some 'Chocolate Cherry' tomatoes. I also saw the tomato 'Mountain Princess' listed with a 45-53 days from transplant to harvest date. Short harvest dates are decidedly a good thing with the unpredictable weather of central WI. Plus, I like the Mountain series. It is predictable. The fruit are of a uniform size, and it was recommended to me as the best tomato for our local area by a garden stand grower.

I won't delude myself that I could transplant tomatoes into the garden a month early; even so, central Wisconsin gardeners, like me, it is time to start your tomatoes!

Pictures from the Potager 2

A work house garden Roma-style tomato, 'Opalka'.



'China Rose' winter radish, has a strange growth habit, growing above ground. The taste has been good and sweet though.


Grapes are nearly ready for juicing. I had spotty pollination this year.


The largest Beefsteak tomato I have ever seen. It seems more the size of a small melon.


Celery, I not too excited about the way it has grown for me.

As you can see, I need to harvest and preserve this bounty.

Later...

Supersweet 100 Tomatoes

Out at the family garden I have several different types of tomatoes. We have 'Olpaka', 'Roma', 'Siberian', 'Beefsteak', 'Early Girl', and not the least, although decidedly the smallest, 'Supersweet 100'.

I've picked a couple Olpakas so far, but quite a few of the cherry tomato 'Supersweet 100'.

A lot of gardeners have told me, "You have to plant 'Supersweet 100s'. They are so sweet!" Yet not one of these gardeners has ever proffered any so I could sample the proof of the harvest. I wasn't too excited, but someone had given me a seed packet and I did have a cherry tomato started, so I figured, "what the heck!"

I take it back. They are like berries, like a raspberry. Like pure sugar, they are so sweet.

All of our tomatoes have loaded up, incredibly heavy with hanging fruit. Like my 2 year old nephew would say, "So-o-o hea-vy!" 'Supersweet 100' is no exception to exceeding my yield expectations, but taste, too!

Yup, summer can be sweet!

Tomatoes and 'squitos

Tomato 'Olpaka' planted through black landscape fabric.



Celery and beets in the potager.

Been sicker than, well, not a dog. Faithful Companion seems to be rarely ill. I think I slept 35 out of the last 36 hours. The other hour I threw up like 15 times.

I suppose the world has kept turning and the plants have been growing.

The twelve inches of rain has brought forth a bountiful harvest of mosquitoes. A cloud of them attack any breathing, blood-pumping gardener stepping foot into the outdoors.

When I feel better, I will battle the 'squitoes...