The Bountiful Harvest

Here is my harvest from yesterday.  Another good day in the old truck patch yielded green beans, carrots, cucumbers, zucchini, onions, tomatoes, and green peppers.  If only I didn't have a day job and four kids, the tomato harvest would be much better.  I bet as many as picked are already rotten because I didn't get to them soon enough.

I don't know if this picture does it justice, but a full size grocery bag is 2/3 full of green beans.  Again, my tardiness in harvesting resulted in a few undesirables, but I still yielded 7 quarts of canned beans and a four gallon bowl of fresh beans in the fridge.

Here are the good, or at least partially good tomatoes.  I'm running seriously low on canning jars, so I think there will be a lot of fresh tomatoes eaten in the next week.  Really wishing I had signed up for the farmers market!

 We have eaten quite a few cucumbers, and yesterday's harvest was substantial.  So I made 8 pints of pickles.  These are garlic dill, and half of them have a dried habanero pepper in the bottom.  We have a quart jar with a habanero that is ready to eat.  I am waiting for Uncle John and Aunt Linda to visit to open that up and see how well we like it.

This is my carrot harvest.  Funny, it looks like a couple more cucumbers slipped in with them.  Kind of like in the garden where the green bean vines are climbing the tomato plants and mixing in with the sweet potato vines.  Note to self, more spacing next year.

I am excited about this first harvest of carrots because it means my picky eater, Logan, will finally enjoy something we grew.  Grace is picky too, but likes a fresh carrot.  Definitely a side dish on tonight's diner menu.

The only thing ready that I don't have pictures of is our sweet potatoes.  They are still in the ground, as that is where they will keep the best until we need to eat them.  Next time I'm out in the garden, I'll snap a shot of them as they are bursting out of the ground they are so big.

We must truly be blessed with good earth, because after all the dry weather in June and July, we still are managing a bountiful harvest.  We don't want it to go to waste, so if you are nearby, come visit and I'll send you home with some.  The food tastes better when grown on the east half of the southwest quarter.

Freely Given, Freely Received

We spent $73 on seeds for our garden this year.  It was a lot more money than I would have thought we would spend.  However, we do seem to be getting our money's worth.  We have made 5 quarts of pickles, 4 quarts of spaghetti sauce, 9 quarts of green beans, and 7 quarts of tomatoes, and frozen 3 quart bags of corn.

That doesn't even count the vegetables eaten fresh or used in recipes directly from the garden.  For sure we have used 4 dozen ears of corn, 2 dozen green peppers, a quart of green beans, 2 dozen onions, 10 heads of garlic, 5 pounds of tomatoes, 2 dozen zucchini, and 2 dozen cucumbers.  I would say I am light on every one of those estimates.

In addition, we have bartered or sold vegetables, receiving $22 of value in return.  If I add up the cost at Kroger of the above amounts, the cost would be  $175.00.

That means that for our time and effort, we have profited $114.00.  Non monetary benefits include eating produce that has a greater quality taste, free of pesticides and chemicals, and learning more about the food we are putting in our body.  Plus, we are a little more in shape from the exercise of tilling and preparing the garden, pulling weeds, and picking vegetables.

But all who know me well, know that I can't leave well enough alone.  Just imagine if I could find a way to get the $73 worth of starter seeds at no cost to me.  Why my profit margins would sky rocket!  Let's see, how could I possibly manage this task?

Oh yeah, these are plants.  They freely give me their seeds at the end of their production!  So with a little research, (learning something new keeps the brain sharp right) and a little bit of effort, I am planning on saving my seeds to start my garden next year.

First up, asparagus.  Pictured to the left is the drying process for the seeds I discovered the other day.  I am particularly excited about this venture for a couple reasons.  One, most things I read say we mostly have non seed bearing asparagus being grown, so I feel lucky to have found one plant in our patch that was seed bearing.  Second, this patch was originally planted by Fred & Marian Worrell, my wife's grandparents.  They planted it around 1975 and we are still eating from it.  By propagating seeds from this patch, I believe that their great-great-great-great grandchildren will be eating asparagus as a result of their efforts.

Now this is a long term project.  I dried the seeds for planting in early 2013.  We will have to see how well it grows, and if it does well, we won't be able to harvest until spring 2015.  Progress reports shall be forthcoming as we continue to become more self sufficient here on the east half of the southwest quarter 

Good News Bad News

I went out early this morning to pick a few ears of corn, which I was sure would be ready.  I intentionally left them during the last picking, thinking they needed a couple more days.  Well, there are not any good ears left.  Something is eating them.

Based on the fact the stalk isn't knocked over, I think deer not raccoon.  I found plenty of deer tracks near my tomato plants and peppers as well.  While that isn't good for the vegetable garden, it is about to be hunting season.  With the drought, we were worried about the health of the deer population.  With them eating out of my garden, I think hunting season will be just fine on the east half of the southwest quarter.

My Animals Eat Better Than I Do

Here is a picture of today's harvest, excepting the sweet corn which I already put in the fridge.  I intend to eat it tonite.  I had been looking forward to eating the corn we harvested two nights ago.  We were sure I brought it in, but neither Susan or I could remember seeing it in either fridge.  When we harvested those nine ears, we gave away all that we already had figuring we had enough for our family.

When I was in the garden today, I found seven of those nine ears.  The bag I put them in was still sitting in the garden.  The remaining seven ended up going to Norbert, Rocky, Donkey, and the chickens.  At first I was a bit upset, but realized, I wasn't wasting any food.  I was feeding food I grew to the animals, meaning I don't have to buy feed.

Part of the goal of growing our own food is being self sufficient.  I have to remember that I don't have to actually eat everything.  We have bartered food this week for things we are short of.  We have given food away, knowing that our generosity will be repaid at some point in the future.  My mood changed as I watched how much the animals enjoyed the semi fresh corn.

So in this drought, where we have had slimmer pickings on sweet corn, we missed out on one meal.  But our loss was the animals gain, here on the east half of the southwest quarter.

Asparagus Omelettes

As I type this, I've been inside now for 41 minutes.  I finished tilling the garden at 9:42, after a day of working on some landscaping around the property and doing some mother's day/birthday shopping.  My wife shares her birthday with Mother's Day occasionally, and this is one of those years.

Now, I may be very late in tilling my garden.  In my defense, I am a part time farmer with a day job.  In addition I have two sons playing high school baseball, one son in middle school track, and my daughter plays softball.  So Sunday is my only true free day and given the rain we had lately, it was the first time I could do it.  Plus, I put priority on the purchase of gifts for my wife.  

Which, I might add, she has apparently found one of them, and is asking my son why it is in his closet.  Apparently, she can't remember she asked for it.  Let's give her some time and maybe she'll forget she saw it.

Anyway, back to the farm.  Today Jared found a new hiding place for our egg layers.  20 eggs was the bounty.  Using the "does it float" test, we determined them all to still be good eggs.  We are still harvesting asparagus, and I think breakfast tomorrow will be asparagus omelets with Parmesan cheese.  

It makes me a bit sad to think that if I just plant the garden this week we will be waiting patiently for a harvest from that endeavor.  In the mean time, I will concentrate on the cherry tree and try to beat the birds to them for some wonderful cherry pie.

I also notice the black raspberry bushes in full bloom, so I am getting anxious to see them begin to fruit.  I can't wait to begin to reap the harvest.  Patience is a virtue, but not one that God gave to me.  Next year I am definitely going to have to start my garden indoors so that I can be enjoying it sooner.

Up next, I'll begin posting pictures of the cherry blossoms and black raspberry bushes.  As soon as the plants in the garden begin to grow, I'll post pictures of that too.