Not that I really want onions

Do I really care about Texas Sweet Onions? No, not really. But, there exists a patch of harsh clay adjoining the NE part of my structure (house). Well, in reality harsh clay exists throughout my yard. But a mountain is conquered one step at a time. So, one step would be to deal with this chunk on the NE that is right under the drip.

They had the Bonnie bulbs for sale - 80 of them for a dollar. Some one hundred days from now, that crisp dollar bill plus 2 hours of weeding and burying these bulbs should turun into 5-10lbs of onions. But these onions have it cut out for them - no mercy in this clay; this is a test in resilience for them. If not, its another step in cultivating that area and keeping it fungus free for the season.

Dolly is growing it for Vaishnavi

I was sure that I was done buying tomato plants twice this season. But the third time is a charm - you can take my word for it. Yesterday, we brought home a grown (defined as something taller than 4 inches) Early Girl tomato. The selection critera were: as woody as possible, as few branches as possible, healthy (disease free), as tall as possible and ideally, with some flowers. The winner was about a foot tall, had poor posture (which I will address with aggressive staking) and three yellow flowers.

This morning, hubby and I drove to landfill to bring it some fresh compost and mulch. She is now in the ground, watered and well. All this preparation is to welcome Vaishnavi to San Diego on May 3. Generally speaking, Early Girls deliver a ripe fruit some 40 days from flowering. If that does pan out, Vaishnavi can step out to the garden, harvest her tomato and eat it in her salad. I think she is going to like it :)

My versatile tomato cage

Last year, I'd purchased this redwood lattice duly spliced in three (two for me and one for Rachel) from Home Depot fully expecting that they'd see me through the next five years of pole beans and sweet peas. It turns out that San Diego's dense (not!) rainfall and perpetual humidity has over powered the resilient redwood and I expect to at best derive two growing seasons out of these immaculate works of carpentry. So, the new experiment for the year - grow pole beans on a tomato cage. I've transplanted four saplings to a cage - one for the cutworms (or whatever other magical creature that likes to eat the first four inches of a five foot tall vine), one for bad weather (or any other such natural misfortunes) and two to feed my family.

The cage is 54"H x 18" (diameter) of heavy duty galvanized steel wire, seems sufficiently sturdy to support my rigorous beans. Isn't that what I'd said about the lattice? I will report at the end of the season.
Some other time, I plan on letting sunflowers shoot some 8-10 feet into the sky and let my beans climb on them - wouldn't that be a visual delight? Hold that thought; I still don't have a way to harvest the beans regularly...
PS: Tomorrow will be a busy day - off the landfill for my square yard of mulch.

My navel orange tree costed $5 in the 1870's

Did you know that all the Washington Navel Trees in California came from two mother plants (of which only one survives to this date)?

In 1873, Eliza Tibbets has convinced William Saunders at The Department of Agriculture to give her the two navel trees that originated from Brazil’s Bahia Province. Saunders hoped the foreign trees would thrive in Riverside, and indeed they did. The oranges produced by the parent navel trees were not only sweet tasting, but were seedless as well. Rumors about the seedless oranges, later named “Riverside Navel,” spread like wildfire amongst local area residents. Demand was so robust that Eliza Tibbets selling budstock for $5 a bud, a fortune for that time in history.

I offer my humble obeissances to this mother plant as I get ready to pull out my own Washington Navel Oranges from my baby plant. My plant is about three and half feet tall, a foot taller than what it was when I brought it home some eighteen months ago. As you may know it takes a few months for an orange to mature on a plant, so it has been several months of graciously contained eagerness. Boy, doesn't gardening moderate that incessant pursuit of instant gratification in the world!

Thee inches tall and counting

I'm dreaming of grated radish in yoghurt. I can think of grated radish with falafels and humus. I can continue thinking many more yummy thoughts - but that's not what this is all about. This is about my radish saplings that have put out some real leaves and stand a majestic three inches above the ground. That dense brown mulch is caffeine (courtesy: Starbucks). I seem to think that they might be weed deterrents; I will let you know how true that hypothesis is at the end of the growing season. ps: In case you've noticed the green shoots behind the radish, those are onions. I hope the sulfur in the big bulbs would keep us fungus free this growing season.

The Quail Gardens Tomato Plant Sale

So I was at my desk at work this week when I received an email from my sister. Jenny, our neighbor had invited one of us to join her to a trip to the Quail Gardens Tomato Plant sale. The kicker - my sister's email mentioned, in line with her post on "no more tomato plants", that I was barred from bringing more tomato plants home.

Come Saturday morning, I walked over to Jenny's and she had another surprise for me - a coupon that allowed me 1 free tomato plant. Ah, now there's no way I'm going to return with no tomato plants.

For the exotic variety seeker, the annual tomato-mania event at Quail offers a plethora of choices. From the garden variety early girls and better boys, I found tomatoes with the word chocolate in their names - irresistable. That said, since there was no promise of cocoa blended tomatoes, I figured I would finally step out armed with 2 tomato plants - a pear tomato and a type with a name called "banana legs".

The pear tomato is a cherry, supposedly a profilic producer, but what drew me to it was the promise of vitamin C loaded tomatoes which look like christmas lights. Let's see how that pans out in the yard - will be rather cool to have Xmas in the summer, and mimic the southern hemisphere.

After this week's foul short tournament at work, and the term spaghetti arms that went with it, I was somehow attracted to the banana legs moniker. How does a tomato get associated with a banana? Apparently, this one is pasty and meaty. The shape tends to be longer than not, and a yellow color suddenly scream banana. All the 6" pots had plants with baby flower buds in them, and we promptly put them in the ground yesterday. After this morning's Starbuck's run for used coffee grounds, and the mild drizzles, I'm anxiously waiting for those first banana legs to get going

Keeping up with the Loffts

Conspicuous consumption they say occurs when "households care about their relative standard of living" in relation to their societal peers (J Gali, 1994). But what I did shouldn't concern the Loffts or the ivory tower researchers.

I'd built this outstanding trellis from pieces of wood that are about to be composted and earmarked it for my beans. Instead of the beans, I put in a bunch of Sweet Ann Snap Peas. It was me following Jenn's bright example of pretty flowers and nitrogen fixing with the last little "not-frying hot yet" weather we have. I'm unsure whether the April sun might roast these tender vines. Even if they're not roasted brown, I am unsure if it might be too warm to produce. If nothing, we will will assign it to being a curious character's nature-defying experiment. By late April, it will still not be too late to put more beans in the ground.

Don't spill your beans too soon

Gardening is a character building passion. Just when I expressed disappointment about lack of germination on Patch #1, I noticed some sprinkles of green buried in all that compost and mulch. In the spirit of not speaking ahead of my time, I am not ready to rejoice just yet. I'm giving this a couple of weeks to determine whether we've new weeds or if our seeds are indeed celebrating a new chapter life. My old man will be proud and I hope my daughters will learn.

On a different note, my daughter (Chili) will turn two this May. A heart-warming ritual in my gardening life is walking my little darling around the yard, narrating some stories, pointing to colors, smells, textures and sounds around us. We just walked back from our evening walk and she couldn't quite grasp how these pink flowers on the nectarine tree will turn into delicious fruits this summer.

I pointed to the neighboring nectarine - drenched in fruit set. I promised her delicious smoothies this summer. Coming to think of it, so many of these "natural" processes are miraculous and dramatic. Its a shame that we can be so consumed by our narrow pursuits and the microscopic events that punctuate them. In turn, we fail to notice the predictable, yet dramatic changes in life forms around us. I wonder if being more aware of one's surroundings will help us stay in tune with emotions of people around us - better relationships for an enriched life.

More sweat with very little to show for it

Don't things always take twice as long and turn out to be three times as hard? It takes muscles that I reconnect with every spring to break through clay, haul buckets of earth a few feet and fight that ongoing war against the weeds. I'm a proud owner of a gas-powered weeder now; mastery of this tool is right around the corner.
Patch #1 is complete now - tomatoes have been staked and caged, the marigolds are in and so are several seeds. The infant on the block are my carrot saplings that have their toothless smile on display all day. No alacrity or any signs of life from radish, basil and onions. That said, I've a secret patch of roots growing in the backyard - I'd sprinkled some of these left over seeds and gave it no more that in attention. This afternoon, I noticed several little green strips jutting out of the dirt. Some of them have pink heads - round and juicy beets in the making!

No more tomatoes please

I promised myself when I was harvesting last year that I would not plant so many tomatoes.

I promised myself when I was pulling them out at the end of the growing season that I would not plant so many tomatoes.

I promised myself when I ordered my 10 plants from Julie that I would not plant so many tomatoes.

What did I do when I had to pick up more plants for Stephanie? I decided to buy some more for myself. Allow me to explain myself:

(i) you recall that instead of Sungold Cherry, we brought home Snow White Cherry. It was an honest mistake and I needed Sungold after all. I even bought Jenny one. Come June, Liam should be able to down sweet cherrries right off the vine.

ii) I've never grown black tomatoes. Julie suggested that try one and so I must. We've the Black Zebra, an indeterminate that, 85 days, should offer us perfectly round 1½" to 2" fruits with tender, deep dark red to caramel colored skin beneath vertical dark green and mahogany streaks. I am to expect flavors of smoke and sweetness with this.

iii) I've never tasted a black cherry. So, we brought home a 65-day indeterminate that would grow into tall, strong vines and produce a rich complex of black flavors.

All said, my commitment to companion gardening is here to stay - more tomatoes, more marigolds.

It is all in soil

Step 1: Spread some gypsum over this clay and water it down. If I'd a wheel, I could be doling out some serious pottery with this chunky dirt (yikes!).

Step 2: Repeat that process a couple of days in a row.

Step 3: Dig up the entire area (at least a foot deep) and apply human traction to break the clay up (i.e., burn calories).

Step 4: Dump an enormous amount of compost (live compost is available free at the local landfill), manure and other such delightful soil amendments.

Step 5: Invoke the shovel Gods - mix this all up.

Results: Some 50 cu ft of compost / soil amendments have gone into a 220 sqft bed to make up these little hills. Go figure!

PS: In four years or so, I might have beautiful soil (I hope).
PPS: You get serious brownie points for guessing how many man hours of sweat these five steps represent.

Leaf curl woes

Our regal peach tree stands some nine long feet tall at 10AM to the backdoor. About a month ago, the tree burst out into this delightful pink blossom; we all cheered. But now, it is infested by the "leaf curl disease" that has spread throughout. It is so severely distressed that I had to pull out every leaf cluster out there leaving the tall barren plant with less than a handful of green specs. The hideous fungus has gone on to infect the shorter peach sibling that is to the left. At this point, I am hoping that it hasn't furthered into the nectarine to its left.

How did I get it this far? I noticed these strange leaf curls probably a week or so ago. Being a believer that in nature's self-correcting mechanisms, decided to take a wait and watch approach. While it is a shame that we've to grapple with such a severe fungal attack, take heart that there is not much that I can do once it is in the leaves. The traditional approach is to spray a copper-intensive fungicide once all the leaves drop.

As a first step, I've hand-removed infected leaves in the shorter peach. I plan on trying an oregano+thyme oil spray - will record how effective that effort is.

Beans are alive and kicking

As the mercury crawls back up, more of our beans are showing their crinkled new born heads now. Our trellis is up and ready to take 'em on. Growing plants in flats is rather onerous; give them a chance to put their first leaves out and the beans should be grounded.

One patch at a time

The journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step. So, I've started by preparing the first patch that is some 9ft wide and 12 ft long. Behind this concise phrase "preparing a patch" lie buckets of sweat, uprooting a forest of weeds, digging through a foot of disgustingly poor quality dirt (read: blue clay), straightening bent metal (tools) and tilling 20 cubic feet of soil amendments in. For the detail oriented, my amendments include - seaweed, free compost from the landfill, coffee grounds from Starbucks, vermicompost from my bin and some gypsum.

Next, I play "designer goddess" - sit there and intellectualize about the what plants play well with others, how quickly will each grow, what their whimsical watering requirements might be, how much room would each one like, what diseases will each likely harbor and what nutrient depletion patterns to expect.

That is the waking thought. Then comes the resting reflection - what colors would I like to see on the patch, how will I line it, how do I achieve visual symmetry, how will I attract bees and what can I cook garden fresh this summer.

Here is what that appears like in the physical world. The trellis (my art in carpentry) right in the middle is going to have pole beans around it - maybe some ten of them. These slender vines will hopefully fix enough nitrogen for the voracious feeders around them - eight tomatoes, carrots, radish, onion and some basil.

Carrots (Umbilliferae family) - to attract hoverflies, which go after many tomato pests.

Basil - to repel flies and mosquitoes, supposed to improve the growth and flavor of tomatoes. Some others say, basil is also able to ward off spider mites, aphids, and whiteflies.

Marigolds - to repel whiteflies and nematodes.

Onions (placed away from beans) - their sulfur is a natural fungicide.

A border of colorful flowers should hopefully invite the bees and we're off to the races!

Beta carotene

Late last fall when I pulled out the tomatillos, the notion of crop rotation was front and center. Between life and two little kids, all it amounted to was some some carrot seeds we sprinkled in the tomatillo patch. It received no attention other than the faithful drip irrigation over its head set at some predictable routine. A couple of weeks ago, admist my disgusting weed forest, I noticed this strange plant that I suspected might have fleshy roots. Much to Chili's delight, this is our proud display of orange taproot.

Spring 2009 - Take 2

Second time is a charm. It was a chain of non-stoppable events - Rachel emailed me on Friday that our tomato saplings were ready for pick up. Before you knew it, Erika, Rachel and I were in her "it keeps on going" van to Julie Rader's to pick up. It turned out that Erika was helping Rachel get an early start to her days by setting clocks on Utah time. So, we were back in an hour or so (second time is a charm) to greet our pretty little heirloom tomatoes.

According to our neighbor Julie Rader at Proven Winners, here's what we have signed up for:

i. Hawaiian Pineapple: In 90 days, this indeterminate heirloom will offer us beautiful large to extra large yellow beefsteaks. When they ripen, they will turn to a deep gold and develop red marbling on blossom ends that continue into the flesh. Voted #1 at the 2003 Tomatofest as the “Best tasting tomato – overall”, I've been promised a sweet and fruity treat.

ii. Limmony: In about 80 days, this indeterminate heirloom from Russia should yield 8 to 10 oz lemon yellow, smooth, blemish free beefsteak tomatoes. The high acid content is supposed to deliver a clean taste and a crisp flavor. Oh, and I've been instructed to cage them with heavy duty wire mesh - large fruits on large plants.

iii. Neves Azorean Red: This 75-day indeterminate red tomato was developed by Anthony Neves, who brought seeds from the Azores. I picked it because it was labeled disease resistant, long bearing and hopefully flavorful.

iv. Snow White: This was a mistake. We thought we were bringing the early cropper Sungold Cherry. Now that it is in the ground, let's describe it - 75 days, indeterminate ivory-colored cherry tomatoes that ripen to a pale yellow on productive vines.

It is not warm enough yet for His Japanese Majesty - Momotaro. Julie has offered to drop 'em off in two weeks or so.

Spring 2009 - Take 1

I live in Encinitas, CA some three miles inland from the majestic Pacific coastline. At 7am or so, Moonlight beach looks like this all year. So, by Valentine's day, encouraged by the bright Californian sun, I welcomed spring into 2009 and started pole beans in flats.

Some twenty four sprouted beans in pretty potting soil and two long weeks of assuring Jenny and Rachel that I will deliver bean saplings in short order - not a shade of green to save my life. Just when I about to blame the stale seeds or the seven months they spent in my freezer, one little bean popped his bald head pushing out a mound of peat moss. It was a reminder in "adaptation" for me.