Monday August 17, 2009
Harvest Time

Harvest time has arrived and we are busy, busy, busy in the garden. The insects and diseases also have arrived; but first a harvest update. In addition to our ongoing crop of Swiss chard, beets, carrots and broccoli, we are now harvesting cucumbers, green and wax beans, cabbage, onions, zucchini and herbs. And the tomatoes have finally started to ripen after a cool spring and summer. We have harvested Stupice, Amana Orange, Lemon Boy and Purple Cherokee. We have a number of sweet peppers setting on but they are still green. We are hoping to have some deliciously ripe red peppers in a couple of weeks. Now for the pest and disease update. We have placed a floating row cover on the edamame to keep the Japanese beetles at bay. The cucumber beetles are attacking the cucumbers, zucchini and squash. Our experiment with pheromone traps has been a disappointment. The traps have caught many types of flying insects successfully but not the cucumber beetles! The bees are still activity pollinating the plants so we will refrain from spraying with rotenone/pyrethrin. We may try floating row covers next week. And the rabbits have finally made an appearance, chowing down on our maturing beets. They cleverly eat about two-thirds of the beet, leaving the leaves upright, which then camouflage the damage until you pull the beet out of the ground; exasperating to say the least. We will try cayenne pepper this week to discourage the predation. If that doesn’t work, we may to resort to chicken wire cages. Given our recent cool and damp weather, it is no surprise that powdery mildew has made its annual appearance. And the tomatoes are losing their lower leaves to a variety of fungal diseases but nothing out of the ordinary. Luckily, we have not been afflicted with the tomato late blight (Phytophthora infestans) that has wiped out so much of the East Coast tomato crop.

Sunday July 12, 2009
Water Before Harvesting Root Crops

“I have new found respect for rabbits”, so said one of our volunteers while harvesting beets and carrots. The soil in our garden is heavy clay and while we have added some compost to it this year, it hasn’t been enough to make a substantial difference yet. When the soil dries out a bit, it becomes like cement, making it tough to get root crops out of the ground. Our solution to the harvesting problem was to water the soil, then harvest the crops. Moist soil makes pulling weeds and transplanting seedlings easier, too. If your garden has unamended clay soil, try watering with a sprinkler for 60 minutes the day before you need to work the soil. Your gardening work will be easier. On a slightly different note, the rabbit(s) did nibble on the shoulders of some of our Chioggia beets; they didn’t touch the Early Wonder or Cylindra. In addition to carrots and beets we are harvesting peas, Swiss chard and broccoli. To keep our garden producing we re-seed areas as soon as we finish harvesting. We have planted new rows of snap beans, pole beans, beets and carrots. We will continue to re-plant until about August 1. We are experimenting with green manure on plot 58. What is a green manure? It is a cover crop grown to add organic matter and nutrients to the soil. We have chosen to use buckwheat as our green manure crop because it grows quite quickly and is supposed to be good at weed suppression. We planted the buckwheat in late June and expect to let it grow 4-6 weeks before tilling it in. No later than early August we plan to plant a second round of buckwheat.

Wednesday June 03, 2009
Succession Planting

Our garden is shaping up! Except for a couple of small spots, the garden is now fully planted. This week we seeded corn, summer squash, bush beans and edamame and transplanted rosemary, thyme and sage plants to the herb section. We continued our succession planting of beets, kohlrabi and spinach. What is succession planting? Well, the term can have three different meanings – nothing is ever simple! Definition One: A new crop is planted after the first is harvested to keep all land in production. Given the length of our growing season here in Barrington, this type of succession planting involves crops with days to maturity of 75 days or less such as beets, lettuce and kale. We hope to have our first significant harvest by June 30, so we will keep you posted on our replanting efforts. Definition Two: The same crop is planted at intervals to have a continuing harvest during the growing season. This type of succession planting works well with the shorter season crops such as beets and carrots and also with summer squash, cucumbers and broccoli. At Smart Farm we aim to plant at 2-3 week intervals for certain crops. This week was our third round of planting beets, kohlrabi and spinach. Definition Three: Different varieties of the same crop with different days to maturity are planted to have a continuing harvest. This type of succession planting works well with tomatoes, potatoes, cabbage and sweet peppers. At Smart Farm we have planted seven different tomato varieties, two of cabbage and four of sweet pepper; we will post updates about when they mature. It all sounds a bit complicated but it is easy to learn how to do it and the great benefit is that with succession planting you can ensure a variety of produce is ready for harvest on a continuing basis in your garden.

Sunday May 31, 2009
It’s All in the Hands

10 gauge wire requires some significant hand strength to bend! That is the anecdotal conclusion of the Smart Farmers on the topic of building tomato cages from concrete remesh. And how, you ask, did we find ourselves having to wrestle with five foot swathes of recalcitrant wire? Read on! One objective we have at Smart Farm is to demonstrate various growing methods for a given crop so residents can see what option will work best for their gardening situation. As tomatoes are a favorite crop, we decided to demo three growing methods: vertical trellis, angled trellis and cages. For the cages we discovered the Texas Tomato Cage which has twin virtues: they are sufficiently tall (six feet) and they fold for easier storage. What we didn’t consider was the cost. To purchase six cages the cost was $120.00 or $20/cage. While it is true they are supposed to last a long time, $20 bucks is still $20 bucks. So, we searched for an alternative. We could not find any garden or landscape wire fencing that fit our requirements. The wire was either too short, too flimsy or the mesh size was too small (you do have to be able to get your hand in to pick the tomato and then get the tomato out!). It was then we discovered concrete remesh (a.k.a. concrete reinforcing wire). It was five feet tall, had a 6” X 6” mesh and was quite sturdy. No kidding - it is made of 10 gauge wire. We bought a 50 foot roll and set off for the garden. Using leather gloves, a big wire cutter, a whole lotta muscle power, a big rock and some hose to hold down the wire and lots of laughter, we assembled seven, 2-foot diameter cages. We then attached the cages to 5-foot u-posts to keep them stable. And the approximate cost of each cage? About $11, excluding labor of course! And they look like they will last a very long time.

Wednesday May 27, 2009
Tomatoes in the Mist

The hardy Smart Farm gardeners were out today planting tomatoes in the mist. May I say that tomato plants, unlike gorillas, won’t scamper away when you get too close. And hopefully no poachers will come to cut off their heads this season! And yes, it is true that you really shouldn’t work with tomato plants that are wet as it can facilitate the spread of fungal diseases. However, we decided to risk the endeavor anyway. We shall see how the plants thrive. As the soil in our garden is not all that it might be (= lots of yellow clay!), we installed the larger tomatoes using the trench planting technique. In this method you lay the tomato on its side rather than dig a really deep hole. You also remove all but the top three leaves. The nodes where the leaves are removed will sprout roots, helping secure the plant in soil and increasing its ability to take up nutrients and water. We only broke one plant – a Purple Cherokee - but luckily our intrepid Smart Farm seed starters had started LOTS of tomato plants. Once we finished getting the tomatoes in the ground, we installed our Garden Bio-Film which we purchased from Territorial Seed Company www.territorialseed.com. This mulch, made from cornstarch, is supposed to degrade into the soil in 50-60 days. We are using it around two-thirds of tomatoes as well as our eggplant and peppers. We will keep you posted on how it performs.

Wednesday May 20, 2009
It’s A Scorcher!

A milestone event: we hosted our first volunteers at our Ron Beese Park garden location! Come join us to learn, grow and share! Despite the unseasonably hot and WINDY weather, we all had great fun weeding and planting. We carefully planted our own home-grown cabbage, cauliflower and cucumber transplants only to see them get thrashed about in the wind. As a protective measure we placed hoops over the transplants and then covered them with floating row covers. And what exactly is a floating row cover? It is a spun bonded polypropylene fabric permeable to air, light and rain. It comes in various weights and can be used to protect plants from frost, wind and insects. We also started installation of our tomato trellises. A tomato trellis??? Yes, you can trellis tomatoes. We will have two trellises at our Ron Beese site. One vertical and one tilted at 30 degrees. Some of the tomatoes on each trellis will be pruned and some will not. Over the growing season we will see if one method out produces the other. In addition to trellising tomatoes, we will be using six foot tall Texas tomato cages. Again we will be checking to see if this support method achieves a better result. We really have some serious clay soil in one part of our garden. We planted our greens, lettuce and spinach in that location and they are struggling. To ameliorate the situation we will bring in more compost to incorporate in the soil and see what happens!

Tuesday May 05, 2009
Spring Planting

Our garden at Ron Beese Park is taking shape! In April, in between all those showers, we prepped the soil for our garden. We weeded, removed plant debris from last year and added lots and lots of compost. The soil is heavy clay – no surprise to gardeners in Barrington – and the compost will help improve soil tilth. Many thanks to our Smart Farm spouses who lent a helping hand in all the prep work. Thursday April 23 was our big day. We laid out the garden beds and planted our first seeds! Cool season crops including broccoli, beets, carrots, kohlrabi, peas, spinach, lettuce and other salad greens all found a home in our garden. We also installed the pea and cucumber trellis for our climbing plants. Thistles and some typically unruly mint have made themselves at home in our garden, so a part of each work day is devoted to rooting them out (pun totally intended!). They are both tough customers; thistles have long tap roots and mint enjoys traveling about on its rhizomes. We will keep you posted on our efforts. On Monday, May 4 we transplanted leeks, onions and bok choi we started in flats indoors in March. We used APS flats, available from Gardeners Supply http://www.gardeners.com/APS/APS_Cat,default,sc.html. They are easy to use and generate great results. On Monday we also planted a second round of beets, carrots, kohlrabi and peas. It looks like rain the rest of this week but we plan to be back in the garden early next week for more seeding and weeding.

Friday March 20, 2009
Garden Expo The Smart Farm

Garden Expo The Smart Farm is an educational garden for the Barrington area and nearby communities. Adults, children, and students learn about their Midwest agricultural heritage, organic gardening, the slow food movement and the best practices for living "green" sustainable lives. Volunteer to help us grow our vegetables, using the latest techniques in integrated pest management, water and soil conservation, and composting. All of our produce is shared with local food pantries and groups such as Common Threads, a Chicago inner-city program for kids.