Bumble + Grow

veggies and flowers from an amateur gardener

[bumbleandgrow]

Cabin Fever Garden Projects

Hey guys!

It’s been awhile since I’ve posted, but I’ve continued on my gardening journey still. This down time has given me a chance to work on many garden projects, so I thought why not restart posting more regularly on this blog. I’ve been coming up with a list of fun projects to do for the garden as we ramp up into full swing of spring.

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- Clean/disinfect old pots to be reused again this year. This is especially important if you’ve received some used pots from a friend or neighbor. Over the course of the season, minerals from the soil and fertilizers can build up on the sides of the pots. More importantly, pests, bacteria, and fungi can remain in the pots, damaging your seedlings. There are numerous resources online (such as Garden Therapy), but I find any sort of dilute mixture of white vinegar and soap or a little bit of bleach can really do the trick.

I’ll keep updating more projects to do these next few weeks. I’ve very excited to show you guys all my plant babies soon! Anyway, back to transplanting! 🌱

[bumbleandgrow]

Fall Container Sowings

Ruby Queen Beet

Seeds purchased July 13

Sowed August 14

Lanro Kohlrabi

Seeds purchased July 17

Sowed July 20

Germinated July 23

Transplanted August 15

Watermelon Radish

Seeds purchased August 2016

Sowed August 15

Germinated August 4

Joan Rutabaga 

Seeds purchased July 17

Sowed August 1

Germinated August 4

Thinning just about every other day

Purple Top White Globe Turnip

Seeds purchased July

Sowed August 15

[bumbleandgrow]

Favorite Products

Black Gold Natural and Organic Potting Mix 0.05-0.0-0.0: I like this soil because it doesn’t, shockingly, contain really any nutrients, which is good if you grow an array of vegetables, herbs, and flowers. I originally purchased this mix for my nasturtiums, which flower best in poor soil. This soil is light and fluffy, and I find works best for containers, using the half compost half soil ratio. Root veggies also particularly like this soil. 

Coast of Maine Stonington Plant Food ($14.99): 5-2-4 organic granular fertilizer blend made from lobster, crab, kelp, and fish meal and worm castings. Of course not indicated by the N-P-K ratio, what initially made me purchase this was blossom end rot and the plant food’s high calcium content. Calcium supplements most often are limestone. The problem with limestone is that it rather drastically changes your soil pH. Although all fertilizers change your pH, I wanted mine to stay somewhat the same. This plant food did just the trick and cleared up the blossom end rot in my romas. Coast of Maine also has interesting fertilizers, including a liquid one made entirely from squid.

FoxFarm Grow Big Fertilizer: 6-4-4 liquid fertilizer made from earthworm castings and Norwegian kelp. Good for vegetables, fruits, herbs, and even flowers early in the season when big foliage is needed. Also contains trace amounts of other important macro and micronutrients like iron, zinc, manganese, and, copper needed for plant growth. I personally like it for its relatively low and even ratio. There’s a good feeding schedule here.

Organic Mechanics Seed Starting Blend Potting Soil: I will forever say that this is my favorite seed starting soil. It explains why for so many years my tomato seeds have never sprouted, my squash only sprouted in that plastic baggie trick. The blend contains coconut coir, pine bark, rice hulls, and worm castings which helps retain moisture without getting soggy legs. 

I fully endorse any other products from these companies. These products were just the standouts in a now wide selection organic gardening materials. All companies and products listed above are OMRI-listed. Of course the best fertilizer is your own compost!

[bumbleandgrow]

Update 8.31.17

Sorry for the **really** late posting, but here are some photos for my community garden. With the start of the school year, it feels like my garden is winding down – a time where I reflect on how this summer went, productivity and all. 

Marigolds: I didn’t talk much about these bad boys, but they really took off, surprisingly. They add some nice, unusual color and attract pollinators and other beneficial insects to the garden. Of course, having lots of flowers isn’t always a good sign, I think, of a healthy garden. Flowers, especially ones like marigolds and nasturtiums, do best in soil with low levels of nitrogen. Here, they are telling me to add lots of compost this fall for next year’s garden.

Radishes: Grew for probably 3-4 extra weeks, which usually make them either hard or spicy. I didn’t get a chance to taste them, but I think they were alright. These were the French breakfast, and I really enjoyed growing them this year. Their growing period is only about a month and look real pretty when eating. Plus, I find this variety doesn’t take up as much space per plant.

Peppers: Yea! My first pepper! All things considered (it was my first year growing peppers and we only had one day over 90 and most days in 60s/70s), I was really happy with these. If you remember, the pepper plants here are transplants from starters I bought. Unfortunately, when I don’t start plants from seed, I don’t usually have an emotional attachment to them. I’m sorry to say this was true for these peppers. Also because they didn’t do much for most of the summer. Reminder to self next year: don’t plant peppers next to zucchini. Zucchini overcrowds and starves peppers of sunlight.

Hope you all had an excellent growing summer!

[bumbleandgrow]

Importance of Seed Saving

Finally picked my **overripe** eggplant this morning. (It was the first eggplant the plant produced, so it’s been a long time coming.) It slices like a cucumber, is that really pale green like a cucumber, it even smells like a cucumber, which is really strange all things considered. Following the Seed Savers Exchange guidelines and advice from Janisse Ray in her book The Seed Underground, I chucked the eggplant in the food processor with half a cup of water. First, I used a dough blade, being careful not to damage the seeds, but the blade wasn’t really crushing the eggplant, so I switched to the normal food processing extra sharp blade. Didn’t really damage the seeds, so I went ahead. Then came the strenuous task of separating the seeds from the pulp. I did this last year, but I never really fully did it. This year, since it was only one tiny eggplant, I did it by hand. Took me probably an hour longer, but I was in no rush. But look at all those seeds I saved! Holy cow! Just from one small eggplant, it got maybe 50 seeds. I’m so glad I read Ray’s book and I did this. 

How are you all saving seeds? 🍠

[bumbleandgrow]

8.13.17 Harvest

Jacobs cattle bean: My first harvest of dried beans! I picked 7 of these dried pods when they were yellow-brown in color and opened find exactly what I planted! My dad didn’t even know you could grow dried beans. Just one plant produced these pods (and many more to come), which maybe made about a quarter of a cup. Fairly pleased with this harvest actually.

Henderson black valentine bean: Finally my green bush beans are coming in as well. Wasn’t thoroughly impressed with the productivity of these plants, as opposed to the Jacobs cattle. But they still ended up producing something. Unlike the Jacobs cattle, these beans are good green or dried, so I decided to pick them green. Excited to give these a try anyway!

Little fingers eggplant: Or, at least, I think that’s what they’re called. I had originally gotten these as transplants from the farmers market, thinking they were Black Beauty or New York Improved, pretty standard as far as purple eggplants go. But then I started to get these long, sort of finger-like shapes. That one guy in the photo came out funky with the bottom curling into the top. My mom, who was at first shocked their small size, actually told me she prefers them because of their small size, i.e. easy to chop, and their seedless in nature (being that you pick them pretty immature). They’re actually kind of fun and cute!

Marketmore cucumber: The standard. What can I say? My fin de meaux and Boston pickling cucumbers in the beginning of the season didn’t work out, so these were also transplants. Not unique as far as oddities in the garden go, but they’re productive as hell! Last time came out of the garden with almost ten cukes just from one plant! Only picked two today. There was more to be picked, but I like my big and almost spineless. 

Roma tomatoes: When you plant determinate, you expect to get them all a once, and all at once they did. Mixed in with a few my family bought the market, the romas have taken over the fruit display in my kitchen. I have one plant in a pot out on my deck and five planted in my community garden. That’s enough, right? There is definitely sauce in my future!

How has everyone else summer gardens been going? 🍆

[bumbleandgrow]

Squash plants are smarter than people. They only take on one project at a time. The plant says, 'I've got enough to do.' If it's a big squash, like a Hubbard, it may only make one fruit per vine. The squash says, 'I'll make a helluva squash.' Or it finishes one squash and then says, 'Now I can make another.' That's the psychology of squash.

Dave Cavagnaro, photographer and garden writer, from The Seed Underground by Janisse Ray

Really love squash, and this chapter “The Pollinator” in Ray’s book is the knowledge I’ve been needing for my small 4x4 foot nook for New England pie pumpkin, spaghetti, and violina rugosa butternut squash. So far, The Seed Underground has given me a lot to think about as far as seed preservation (the old preservation vs. conservation conversation but now through the lens of seeds). For me, hand-pollination was this thing that people did when they didn’t have a good garden, when the bees and the other insects wouldn’t come by for various reasons. But now I see that without hand-pollination in vegetables like squash, gardens cannot maintain purity in the seeds they save. Really fascinating stuff! 

[bumbleandgrow]

Fall Gardening 2017

1: Lanro Kohlrabi, Joan Rutabaga, Pink Beauty Radish, & Hollow Crown Parsnip

2: Ruby Queen Beet, Scarlet Ohno Revival Turnip, Prize Choy Pac Choy, & Hollow Crown Parsnip

3: Garden Arugula, Bright Lights Swiss Chard, Purple Globe Top White Turnip, & Watermelon Radish

4: Parisian Carrots (sorry for the fade, left them out in the rain, but still good though!) 

This fall I’m experimenting with first, fall gardening, and also container gardening with root vegetables. My beds at the community garden don’t really have enough space for all of these vegetables yet, so I started the kohlrabi last week as transplants and will start the other root vegetables in containers over the night few weeks.  And fall gardening is giving me a second shot at those Parisian carrots. My spring harvest was alright, but I’m blaming it on the rocky soil in the container. Those parsnip seeds are really old – I’m talking 2013/2014, so I’m just trying to use them up anyway, see if I get anything out of them. Not looking for a huge harvest this fall, just some experience with some of these veggies I don’t normally grow. Worth a shot, right?

Hope to see the sun! 🌦

[bumbleandgrow]

Best “Small Space” Market Varieties to Grow This Year

Who said you needed a large plot of land to be a sustainable farmer? These old heirloom varieties put that notion to bed (the garden bed, that is). While some have been looking for the biggest of the big, I’ve searching down catalogs and websites to find those varieties bred to be miniature, usually via the French. Some of these heirloom varieties are highly productive, like the ‘little finger’ eggplant. It is still the perfect time to get these beauties going and enjoy them all summer long. 

Cabbage: Kalibos cabbage ($3.00, $3.50)

Carrots: Parisian carrot ($1.75, $2.49, $2.50, $2.99, $3.50)

Cucumbers: Miniature white cucumber ($2.25, $2.99, $3.05)

Corn: Blue jade dwarf sweet corn ($2.95, $2.99)

Eggplant: Little finger eggplant ($2.25, $3.49, $3.75)

Greens: Extra dwarf pak choy ($2.50, $3.69)

Lettuce: Tom thumb lettuce ($2.35, $2.50, $2.95, $3.49, $3.95), Sanguine ameliore lettuce ($2.75) Tennis ball ($1.75, $2.50, $2.99, $3.95)

Peas: Kelvedon wonder garden pea ($2.75), Tom thumb garden pea ($3.00), Desiree dwarf blauwschokkers pea ($3.00)

Peppers: Candelight hot pepper ($2.95)

Radishes: Comet radish ($2.29), French breakfast ($1.09)

Tomatoes: Summer sunrise tomato ($2.37)

Squash: Cornell’s bush delicata ($3.95)

Watermelon: Sugar baby bush watermelon ($2.50)

In addition to these lovely vegetables, most annual herbs are perfect for container, small-scale, and urban gardening. Any other varieties I missed? Message me thoughts / comments. 

Have a lovely Monday! 🌧

[bumbleandgrow]

Plants are the original chemists. Their sophistication makes DuPont and Monsanto look like little kids with chemistry sets.

Allen Lacy, garden columnist

Love this! Particularly in biomimicry, it is important for us to understand that nature (which ironically also includes us, humans) has already solved many of modern problems over generations in evolution. We are merely nature’s humble students, understanding only a fraction of what life on Earth here means.

[bumbleandgrow]

7.14.17 Community Garden

Top (left to right): Jacob’s cattle bean, meschlun mix, Henderson’s black valentine bean, Jacob’s cattle bean, marigolds

Bottom left: merveille des quatre saisons lettuce, marketmore cucumber, roma tomato

Bottom center: zucchini

Bottern right: orange bell pepper (hidden-ish), eggplant

[bumbleandgrow]

Propagation is so easy! I don’t know why I never thought of doing it this way for all sorts of herbs, not just rosemary. Plenty of perennial herbs are nice to grow, but some of us are a little too impatient to wait for them to grow full-size. Enter my community garden. Besides the member-owned beds and the larger plot used for the local food bank, there is a small, circular bed (about a four or five feet in diameter) that has loads of perennial herb bushes – beebalm, peppermint, spearmint, rosemary, sage, oregano, lavender, and chives to name a few. The bed is probably my favorite to visit every time I go, besides my own of course. I have been doing my research (namely Arthur O. Tucker’s and Susan Belsinger’s The Culinary Herbal) and had the presence of mind a few trips back to take a few clippings of beebalm, peppermint, and spearmint (along with rosemary, but it was much to young to get anything from). Used these old jars, saved for unknown garden projects at the time, and add enough water. I change it every other day, and I got a massive root from the spearmint (pictured right). The peppermint did alright, but the beebalm was a no go. I took another clipping yesterday, and we’ll see how that turns out.

Thanks for stopping by! 🌱

[bumbleandgrow]

Who knew that in just a short three weeks my well-mannered arugula bolted and grew seed heads? So much so that my sister thought they were weeds. Instead of pulling them out at this point (btw, the reason why they’re look wind-swept was because Western New York was hit by some massive thunderstorms this week), I’m just letting them produce their seeds so I can collect them later when the plants are dried out. In the middle of the pot I have Parisian carrots which have still awhile to go. Along with some ill-fated Valentine’s Day blend radishes, these were direct sowed on April 16th.

Happy summer! 🍑

[bumbleandgrow]

Rochester is known for its stunning 🌸 lilacs at Highland Park, designed by Central Park’s Frederick Law Olmsted. Over the 150+ acres, 1,200 lilac shrubs representing over 500 varieties. My photos are only a snippet of these varieties I had snapped with my phone along the way to the Lilac Festival, the obvious highlight event in May for us in Rochester. While most goers head straight for the booze and music tents, my family and I prefer to mender through the gorgeous park that also includes magnificent magnolias, azaleas, and rhododendrons. But of course nothing is as fragrant as a freshly bloomed lilac bush.

Cheers!

[bumbleandgrow]

A trip to Lamberton Conservatory (Rochester, NY) on such a rainy day! Always fun to see the quail, the seasonal flowers, and the Instagramable cacti that must be over a hundred years old.

[bumbleandgrow]

Earth is here so kind, that just tickle her with a hoe and she laughs with a harvest.

A Land of Plenty by Douglas William Jerrold (1803-1857), English writer

A little bit out of date, but I read this quote on the back of the Mother Earth News June/July 2016 issue. As a quote-hoarder, I just had to post it. I’ve been MIA lately on tumblr, but I promise to get back into the swing of things. Long story short, my plants died (left them in the care of my mother for nine days, and they couldn’t survive that long with her), so I have been busy re-building my garden by planting more seeds and buying transplants from local greenhouses to try to get back some of those tomatoes, peppers, and eggplants. 

[bumbleandgrow]

All gardens need to accept something wonderful and unexpected.

Allen Lacy, garden columnist