Broccoli Challenges

Growing broccoli has been a challenge. We've grown it with varying degrees of success. It can do well as a fall and winter crop, but wither season presents its own problems. 

Planted as a spring crop, broccoli has yielded mixed results. The soil in the early spring is too cold, and transplants grow slowly with unpredictable rainfall in early spring. Our plantlys have been damaged by spring frosts even when grown under row cover. Sudden the weather turns, only to be blasted with intense sunlight and too much heat just as they are starting to make heads. Some times broccoli has been a lot of work and little to show for it.

This year we had more success when we tried a variety that is less bothered by heat. We received a donation pkt of Pakman broccoli seed which, which gave us much better results. The plants grew very uniform, and most produced nice heads at the same time. We have been very please with Pakman and will definitely grow it again next spring and leave the Green Magic for fall-winter

Tomato planting time

We had a wild morning at the garden today, prepping bed and setting out tomato transplants.

After broadforking, weeding and fertilizing two beds, we had almost planted twelve plants into the first when when a downpour interrupted out efforts and sent us dashing to the shed for shelter. When it turned into a thunderstorm with lightening we partially closed the door for a few minutes. After 15 minutes or so, it let up and we planting the first bed. But since the soil was now too wet for working we will have to wait a few days to plant the rest of the plants.

The rain is encouraging after the very dry spring conditions a year ago, so we are grateful.

 

Spring Thoughts

 At this time our spring planting is well under way, and some of our crops are making progress.  With some good rains recently the garden is beginning to recover from the devastating effects of prolonged drought from last fall an into the winter. It goes without saying that much depends upon weather. Many of our fall plants were severely damaged by long lasting aphid attacks due to the prolonged warm season and no frost to kill them. 

So far this spring our snow peas, spinach, and potatoes are doing well. Our fall planted onions are showing stress from drought over the winter. Two plantings of carrots failed, due to a hard frost, and the replanted seed didn't come up. While the rain barrels help, rain is still the best. We are grateful for the recent rains, which have helped considerably.

It's a wrap

As we wrap up the garden for the year, the plant stalks are piled to be shredded this week.

It has been a challenging but productive year, with the weather overall dryer, and several prolonged periods of no rain in both the spring and fall. Fortunately we were able to install gutters on the shed to our rain barrels which has helped significantly during those times when the water is off. Additionally we increased our composting capacity by building two large bins.

We are grateful for a successful year in which we donated 873 lbs. of produce to CORA Food Pantry to date.

  

Community Gardening in the time of Covid 19- part 2

 

Nov. 3, 2020

This is an update to the previous post written last spring during Shelter in Place. 

Initially, none of us could have imagined this situation would last as long as it has. In the spring we thought it might only be for several weeks. As noted in the previous post, the garden was in maintenance mode for a time, but in May we reopened under phase 1 guidelines which allowed up to ten persons to gather in an outdoor space while maintaining social distance. Basically that continued all summer until the fall, as we never really opened to the public. About fifteen gardeners have contributed in some way to the effort, with a core group of eight or so who have been most active. This was about half as many gardeners as we had in 2019.

In spite of everything that happened we have managed to continue through the year and had some good crop yields which allowed us to continue donating produce to the food pantry almost every week. And it has been on a week-by-week basis, of just staying focused and doing what needed to be done at the garden.  The garden is large enough that it is easy to work while maintaining social distance. 

We have the reward of being outdoors in a pleasant environment and also the satisfaction of doing something productive to help others by donating many pounds of fresh produce. For that opportunity we are grateful. All of us miss being able to move about freely and spend time with friends and family, and activities that we were involved in and perhaps took for granted prior to covid 19. Working together in the garden also provides the benefits of some social interaction with others in person that we otherwise might not have.

Community Gardens: Nourishing the Body and Soul

 

COMMUNITY GARDENS:  

 Nourishing the Body and the Soul 

Thursday, December 3, 2020 

7:00PM - 8:30PM 

Register at https://us02web.zoom.us/j/88667421907  

Learn WHY Community Gardens are important and HOW to manage them. 

Mary Ellen McGuire, pastoral associate at St. Thomas More Catholic Church in Chapel  Hill, will discuss why community gardens are an important part of creation care. 

Managers of three local gardens will talk about how to manage and maintain  community gardens. 

 

• Paul & Pat Kelly, Franciscan Community Garden in Raleigh 

• Bob Weickert, San Isidro Labrador Garden in Chapel Hill 

• Deborah Gorman, Koinonia Garden in Chatham County 

Matt Jones of the NC Cooperative Extension Service will explain the services and  resources available through this agency. 

This event is co-sponsored by Orange-Chatham Interfaith Care for Creation  and Interfaith Creation Care of the Triangle.

Back to the Garden

Officially we're back to the garden, now that North Carolina is in Phase 2 of Coronavirus Response. We are open with social distancing, masks, and bring your own gloves and water.

Fortunately, we've been able to keep up with some maintenance and planting in the garden so that we weren't totally overrun by weeds. The Shelter in Place time allowed more than enough time to start seeds at home for transplanting into the garden. What started as some broccoli and tomato seedlings kept multiplying by twelves into the hundreds, and also allowed the advantage of staying safe, getting plants without having to go out and shop. 

So here we are. Saturday we harvested broccoli and turnips to share with CORA, and planted sweet potato slips. 

The garden is large enough to allow for plenty of space for working without being too close to other gardeners. All in all, there is much to be grateful for.