Planting Season

Unlikely to get more frost, so spring gardening approaches.  I did rather well this winter.  Having made a decision last year that vegetables go in the ground in the backyard, while culinary herbs grow in pots outside my front door and in my living room, some of my culinary crop survived.  I have a decent stem of rosemary, a somewhat straggly stem of sage, and a pot of spearmint that has begun its annual recurrence.  In the three chia pots, parsley has big leaves, though not that many.  Chives have been straggly, while basil underperformed previous chia attempts.  The hydroponic aerogarden's dill has overflowed and oregano grows abundantly.  Cilantro was a dud on two attempts.  Sage has sprouted from seed.  Chives has only a few leaves but probably enough for a sandwich.  Basil planted indoors did not sprout, probably due to excessively soggy soil.  Pot put outside to dry a bit, and I have plenty of fresh seeds for a do-over, or to plant basil in a different pot and use the soggy one for something else.

While different plants have different optimal direct in-ground times to plant seeds or transplant vegetables grown from seeds indoors, for my region, the weeks between Passover and Mother's Day seem the calendar's sweet spot.  My pot collection exceeds what I really want to plant.  Moreover, each year Shop-Rite sells discounted flourishing basil, chives, and parsley in containers that I can simply transplant to larger containers all ready for harvest.  I must choose primarily which herbs I want to grow, then enrich the soil, plant the seeds, and label what I have planted in each pot or subsection of a larger pot.

The backyard poses more of a challenge.  I've been formatting the vegetables in the manner of a Square Foot Garden, mostly with disappointing results.  I also have an accessory area that I misjudged trying to plant beets and carrots.  Basically, I have few weed problems because the landscaper many years ago installed weedblock cloth in the defined beds.  My two 4x4 foot beds will generate 32 squares.  The weedblock layer, however, limits my ability to grow root vegetables, despite a previous attempt to make the soil thicker.  Moreover, tomatoes grown from small pots purchased at a top nursery overtake the square allotted to them.  They grow leaves and stems that exceed the ability of my plastic stakes to maintain them upright.  It does not help, that the weedblock layer makes it difficult to insert the supporting stakes as deeply as I might like.  The abundance of green and paucity of fruit suggests that the nutrient mix needs to be better.  Since tomatoes are one of the reliable plants that always taste better from my garden than what the supermarket, or even farmer's market can offer, this gets priority.  I think I will only grow two plants this year, allotting each two square feet, and supporting with cages instead of stakes.  Eggplant and peppers also never reach their potential when grown from nursery pots.  Peppers are easily obtainable at the supermarket, but eggplant more expensive.  My bok choy and lettuce never produce.  Swiss chard is iffy.  Green beans sprout, but the harvest is difficult.  Maybe four squares this year, and a different four than previous years.  Vining plants like cucumber and squash often do well.  Since they need room to spread out, they can only be planted at the outer squares of the grid, but they often produce a very gratifying yield.  This may be the place for that accessory planting portion separate from the 4x4 grid, or maybe even a reason to use a linear rather than grid format for this year's vegetable garden..

Then, once I know what to plant, I need to get the seeds or shoots.  Many of my seed packets are quite old.  I should get some fresh packets.  The best price on seedlings is always Home Depot on sale or the local nursery.  I've priced seeds several places.  I prefer the local hardware store, not because they are better seeds or better value, but because I am grateful for the many times they made it easy to get the home maintenance items I needed in a trouble-free way.  I can spend a little more for loyalty, but I also need selection.  The best prices on seeds seem to be Walmart.  Target sells Burpee for slightly more, but it's a good deal closer than Walmart.  Lowe's seemed expensive.  Home Depot is out of the way, worth it for plants, not for seeds.

So it seems best to invest the week before Passover and Chol HaMoed on planning.  What to plant, herbs and vegetables, which squares or even whether to continue this Square Foot format.  The soil will need to be enriched, so a few packages of organic soil enricher, maybe get a soil test, maybe consider some chemical additives.  Buy a couple of tomato cages.  Then mark and plant and set a maintenance schedule.  Indoor went well this winter.  No insurmountable obstacles to duplicating a reasonable herb and vegetable yield outdoors this season.

Gardening's Late Season

This has been a dud of a garden.  One cucumber, A few tomatoes.  Pretty decent string bean growth.  Green vines and leaves everywhere, overflowing to square feet not intended for them.  Edibles minimal.  My outdoor pots of herbs did not do any better, except for rosemary which thrives.  And I took down my aerogarden, disinfected each component with diluted bleach, and started over with six new herbs.  Even my chia triad is down to its last basil.  I don't know the reason for such poor performance.  For sure, I am not dedicated to tending each planting, going out to the backyard a couple of times a week to week and nourish.  I'm not even committed to harvesting on schedule.  Tomato plants take up more than one square.  They need a cage, not the commercial plastic stakes, to keep them upright.  And beans need regular harvest.  No clue as to why peppers, eggplant, and so many variations of lettuce never produce anything to bring to my kitchen table. Root vegetables unrealistic as weed block beneath the soil would not allow unlimited downward growth.

Culinary herbs in outdoor pots have more promise.  Basil grows.  Chives less so.  Parsley a great disappointment.  Dill and sage seem to do better in my vegetable garden.  Mint, which grows like a weed because it fundamentally is a weed, died in its pot overnight, suggesting some infestation or exposure to an herbicide from our lawn crew.  Mint has to stay in pots for containment.

Chia in my hands only grows basil reliably.  The hydroponic aerogarden also grows basil reliably, so abundant a root system as to crowd out the other five plant cylinders.

The mid-fall season still leaves me pumpkins to check on, but it's really time to uproot what will no longer grow.  Square foot has 32 squares, clean eight a day.  There is a supplemental section that can be turned over, as uprooting everything there is unrealistic.  The deck has three flower boxes that can have their plant remains removed.  For the pots, protect the rosemary indoors this year when it gets a bit colder.  Harvest what can be salvaged, maybe some basil, sage, and parsley for shabbos dinner.  Pluck everything else.  Plant something in the two remaining chia pots and add some diluted fertilizer.  And see how the new aerogarden herbs turn out.  Replace the dead bulb, consider getting their fertilizer pods which worked better than what I use now.

It really becomes how committed I am to having my own sources of herbs when I want them and the sensory superiority of produce from my own garden.  I am willing to do some effort, though not an extreme, focused amount.

This Year's Gardens

Gardening has been removed from my semi-annual initiatives in favor of other things.  While it never became a focus as intended, it has found a niche in my seasonal activity, much like monthly donations or monthly financial review has moved from targeted activity to ordinary continuation.

The plants have four general placements.  In the living room, an aeroponic unit that always underperforms, yielding nothing meaningful to my culinary herb needs.  The chia pots, three of them, have been productive of basil, less of other things, but for the first time I'm giving dill a go.  Outside my front door I plant container herbs.  Bought mint since it was on sale, and bought rosemary since mine never take from seed and I need robust rosemary for cooking.  All else is from seed.  Mostly planted, a few sprouting.

Near the back door on the deck I plant flowers in the tree wooden plantar boxes.  They do well most years with very little care.  And then the big project, vegetables, most not yet chosen.  I started tomatoes, eggplant, and pepper from seed indoors.  All sprouted and were transplanted outside, still alive a few days and one watering later.  Radishes go well.  Some yellow squash planted in a different location than usual.  And I want to have some cucumber in a place where the vines can have room beyond the 4x4 wooden confines of my Square Foot format.  Then choose the rest of the vegetables.  Since weed block limits the depth that root vegetables can pursue, I found another location for carrots and beets this year.  A row format for these.

Maintenance probably twice a week for each bed or container, daily for the indoor plants with near total reconstruction of the aerogarden needed as a single focus.  I don't do well with fertilizing or other feeding, and pests have limited past harvests.  But whatever I can get with the limited focus I am willing to give this will be an increment of personal pleasure later on, something in current short supply.

Replanting the Aerogarden

I've had an Aerogarden Hydroponic Garden for years.  It was steeply discounted.  When I used the original seeds, tubes, soil, and tablet feeds that came with it, it flourished, though one plant overtook the others creating a root mess.  Like many things, they sell you the unit at a discount but gouge for parts.  I have little choice but to replace the proprietary fluorescent bulbs at a premium price periodically but have tried to go cheap with the other elements.  Potting soil I always have.  Herb seeds I always have more than I can plant outdoors.  Nitrogen supplements have not gone well.  And one plant still takes over, this time tarragon, usually basil which grows like a weed in a hydroponic setting.  

After leaving Aerogarden untouched on my Daily Task List for months other than topping off the water, I set a fixed time to give it another go.  It has six tubes.  French tarragon dominates, needed a big harvesting trim.  Some chives with benign neglect are holding their own.  Not enough for flavoring, maybe for a light garnish.  And one tube has slowly growing thyme or oregano, I can't tell which.  That left me three tubes to replant.  Coriander never takes well.  Dill sprouts then withers.  Basil takes over and I have two flourishing plants in terracotta chia pots adjacent to the aerogarden.  Start with sage.  I had plenty of sage seeds.  When I took the tube out, the soil only covered the upper half, so if it ever got roots they would have a gap between the soil and the water, though since the soil felt moist, there must still be some diffusion.  I pushed the soil to the bottom of the tube, added some seeds, tamped it down, and replaced the tube in its set location.  Then some water, then a cover, once a transparent mini-applesauce cup, with a marker to tell me that cylinder has sage.  Next some parsley planted with the same procedure, then some oregano.  Topped the reservoir with water and check for germination in a few days.  Sometimes you make it and sometimes you don't.  Plus, I now have a lot of harvested French tarragon in search of recipes.

Zone 7a

Retrieving the newspaper from the end of the driveway for my wife to read when she first goes downstairs has developed into a morning ritual, right after starting my first k-cup and maybe washing a few dishes.  I wear night clothes for the short trip, typically with flip-flops.  Seasonally cold and dark for this short errand.  While it provides momentary stimulation to begin each day with more prolonged stimulation once the caffeine has been absorbed.  I don't think about warmer weather ahead, though the earth and my geographic 7a zone will eventually heat up enough to support any number of vegetables and herbs.

Gardening mostly brings joy with a few disappointments or frustrations to balance.  I set this in its global form for the current semi-annual projects.  Aerogarden and chia pots with herbs avoid climate considerations.  Chia going well.  Aerogarden needs some revision.  Not nearly as much joy from these as what the outdoor efforts achieve.  I will need to revive the front containers a bit, though last season went OK.  The backyard needs real work.  Trimming branches to better expose my two 4x4 foot beds.  And deciding what and where things go.

While I could purchase established vegetable plants, having mostly failures from attempts at indoor winter planting, I'd like to give the from seed indoors another go with tomatoes and pepper, maybe eggplant.  My soil probably is not thick enough between surface and weed block cloth for serious root vegetables, though I like beets and they are expensive in the supermarket, so possibly a square or two of these as direct plantings.  Lettuce and chard never do well.  Green beans flourish but can be tedious to harvest.  Cucumbers take up more space than they are worth and are cheap at the supermarket.  And this year, plant in sequence rather than all at once.  Better planning.  With some luck, better joy when harvest arrives.

Garden Planted

This would be the year to have a great garden.  It became my HOME entry for my current semi-annual initiatives, one that I maintained.  The Aerogarden semi-flourishes though basil grow too high and coriander did not germinate at all.  but I've used the basil and tarragon, will use the thyme, though the dill seems more suitable for a garnish than a culinary herb.  Chia pots have been repetitive failures except for basil, which eventually outgrows the sponge and withers.  It has great leaves, though, much bigger than the Aerogarden basil which I think is the same seed.  Tried to grow tomatoes and peppers from seed indoors.  They sprouted.  Tomatoes failed on transplant.  Peppers transplanted yesterday.

Outdoor container plants have begun to sprout.  I bought spearmint and have uncontrollable peppermint from last year.  Made the largest pot into a multitasker:  dill, parsley, basil, thyme.  Germination has begun on all but the basil.  Made pots of chives and coriander, no activity yet.  Some flowers have germinated.  Sage and Rosemary from seed likely to fail in the outdoor pots.  Planted sage from seed in the main garden and bought rosemary from Richardson's Garden Center so I know I will have some.

For the backyard, I have two 4x4 blocks devoted to Square Foot Gardening.  After many years, I made the effort to enrich the soil.  Tomatoes and rosemary as plants, all else from seed.  One for herbs + two tomatoes, the other for vegetables.  So it's Dill, Sage, Rosemary, Oregano, Chives, Marjoram, Parsley, Basil, Thyme, and Cilantro.  For the vegetables:  Tomatoes, Peppers, Eggplant, Beans, Bok Choi, Swiss Chard, Cucumbers, and Arugula.  Some watering on schedule, maybe even fix hose reel to do it better.  Then some patience.  Hopefully with weed blocking fabric beneath and layers of nutrients above, weeding will not be too much of a chore.  And this year I need to do better with pests, something I usually neglect, and perhaps enriching nutrients along the way.

But mostly scheduling chores and patience now that the hard elements of enhancing the garden beds and sowing the seeds are behind me.

Failing Aerogarden

One among my many horticultural frustrations has been the inability to harvest my aerogarden.  I bought it on sale many years ago, used the seeds and medium that came in the kit along with the fertilizer pellets.  So far so good.  Never got a great harvest.  Subsequently, I have replanted herbs many times, using some potting soil and vermiculite.  Basil always takes root in the hydroponic environment, most other herbs less so.  This time I thought I had it going.  Basil abundant, though tall enough to have the upper leaves singed by the fluorescent light.  Oregano sprouted, parsley OK, dill recognizable, tarragon with full sprouts, coriander failed to sprout.  I watched it, mixed some generic plant food with water in the concentration recommended, and fed the plants.

Today, the dill and tarragon have met their end, oregano less abundant, parsley a little shvok, but basil appeared sturdy.  I assume the additive was toxic, though there might be other possibilities.  Since having optimal gardens indoors and out has a place on the next set of semi-annual initiatives, I will salvage what I can, then after the new year, reassess and try again.

My Plants

October marks a transition point for the Plant Kingdom.  Leaves scatter over my back yard, less so the front.  I used to devote part of every Veterans Day and Thanksgiving Weekend to raking but in recent years I've been content to let the lawn service's mulching mower shred and scatter the fragments.  Not ideal but good enough.  Annuals have been plucked from my outdoor garden.  Mostly disappointing harvest.  Sage and rosemary are perennials, sage surviving last winter, rosemary not.  I staked the sage upright and come spring will need to add a coating a mulch or topsoil to the garden bed to make the surface above the weed block thicker.  Parsley is apparently a biennial.  I harvested what seems an abundant overgrowth, leaving the roots.  Then in accordance with www advice, which must be true since I read it on the internet, washed and dried what I cut, removed the stems, and created two packages of labelled plastic bags which found a home in my freezer.  Apparently a similar, though more tedious process exists for basil, which grows well indoors, but I can try to salvage the flourishing outdoor container of basil and parsley that way.  I took them inside last year with a very unsatisfactory outcome.  Mint is indestructible so the outdoor container stays outside this winter.  Other planters did not do well, so just stay outside for their reset button or at least reconsideration, next spring.

While my gardening skills never matured, or maybe the talent and dedication to excellence just isn't there, I enjoy having the plants around me.  They come in two forms, a hydroponic aerogarden and three chia pots.  The basil in the chia pot did great until this week when it drooped, probably in parallel to the failure of the fluorescent bulbs on the aerogarden which illuminates the basil as well.  The other two chias have not fared well.  I gave them one last chance, introducing thyme and chives which are now on a windowsill waiting to see if germination happens.  The aerogarden has been a more fickle undertaking.  Basil always does well.  Thyme sprouted in an abundant way also but it wasn't good culinary thyme.  The leaves seemed micro, the stems that held them a stiff tangle.  Used in kitchen once, too hard to separate the leaves.  Probably could have salvaged a bouquet garni.  Other four pods a failure.  To be fair to Aerogarden, using their system seemed too expensive.  They sell their version of soil and nutrients which work better than my home made facsimiles.  To  save money and deal with local availability, I harvest their containers each year, clean them and replace with a mixture of potting soil and topsoil, sometimes vermiculite if I have any.  It will get me a strand or two of whatever herb I plant but not robust enough to take root in the underlying water, except for basil which always dominates.  Instead of their clear plastic shields for germination protection, I convert used Kcups which fit properly, though are white and opaque.  They have fertilizer tablets.  I make my own with liquid plant food proportioned into a wine bottle's worth of water, then added to the water reservoir.  I like my hydroponic garden but not enough to pay authentic aerogarden prices for it.  Where I don't have the option of bypassing the high prices are in the bulbs, which seem to have a more limited activity duration than other fluorescents.  Mine recently failed.  I had a spare, installed it, though it uses two.  I ordered two more.  Then I went to my seed supply, found five things worth a try beyond the basil that I kept, planted them, watered the plastic tubes, put a kcup atop each, and see what happens.  The worst that can happen is another failure.  I can always plant more basil.  

Square Foot Garden

This is the season that I pay attention to my gardens.  Roses from a few years back are now on autopilot with no plans for additions.  My focus has shifted to plants for my kitchen.  These will be a combination of vegetables and culinary herbs, planted in square foot format in the back yard or containers near my front door.  Spearmint has revived from last year.  New container herbs planted, some sprouting.  Aerogarden revived with some painstaking cleaning of the plastic tubes, new soil, and cleaning the hydroponic tub beneath.  First germination on its way.

I spent some time looking at square foot gardening options on the internet, though my familiarity goes back a ways to the original paperback and the show with its somewhat kooky host.  completely outlined all 32 squares in the two 4x4 foot beds, purchased the seeds I will need, the tomatoes and rosemary that I have never been able to grow by seed, and planted the near bed over the last couple of days.  Major rains headed our way so I'll let nature provide the hydration for now.  Each bed has weed block which I find mostly positive, though it really prevents me from including root vegetables in the garden.  Weed control has been a more troublesome task.  I've never made much effort at pest control.  Insects can be examined and sprayed.  Birds and mammals have been more difficult to address though they did not seem to harm my cucumbers or bush beans last year.  protective wiring seems more of a bother than I would like to undertake.

So far, off to a good start.

Ooky Coffee

Up early.  Lots of little projects on my plate that I do not want to pursue right now.  Some bills coming due, a major bank deposit to be prepared, my Aerogarden needs to be set out and my article on Leadership Generated Attrition has been languishing for some time.  I have another week to learn how to use my new camera with 24X zoom in time for my daughter's graduation.  But sometimes I need idle time.  My mind seems to be in gear right after my morning stretch, supplemented by coffee.

The Keurig machine, or actually a K-cup compatible Mr. Coffee impostor that I got with a 20% off coupon a few years ago, has upgraded my every morning except Yom Kippur and Tisha B'Av.  While professional activities, child rearing and sometimes Jewish obligations hindered my development of more personal pleasures, I have taken a fondness to varietal coffee and varietal beer, both relatively economical indulgences compared to the alternatives of skiing and hedonistic electronics.  So the K-cups can be purchased in 48-cup variety packs while the 12-24 cup boxes can be acquired in innumerable varieties costing less that a visit to Brew Ha Ha, which I still do periodically, though more than brewing my own in a French press, which I also still do from time to time.  This morning I had Brooklyn Bean Roastery Vanilla Skyline and Tully's French Roast.  And then Betty the cafeteria lady can be relied upon to deliver a dispenser of pretty decent hospital cafeteria coffee to the Doctor's Lounge, there for the taking.

While the Vanilla Skyline blend was an extreme disappointment, too weak to justify another purchase of it at any discount, any large sampling is bound to distribute in the typical bell shape.  Most varieties fall within 95% of the gustatory mean, a few dreadful, a few superb.  Even though the Vanilla Skyline Blend left me unimpressed after two attempts, the remaining ten plastic containers will get consumed over time rather than wasted.

In a few weeks I allotted myself a few days \vacation tacked on to the Endocrine Society Annual Meeting in San Francisco.  I've always wanted to see Yosemite and visit the wineries, another source of immense variety.  A convenient base nearby to each might be Modesto, home to E & J Gallo, which I can get at any local store.  I will need to make a decision on witnessing wine made on an immense scale for a mass market like Gallo does, or more to my liking seeking out much more limited operations developed to allow expression of the winemakers' passion for their own individual craft.  It is the difference between a French press of commercial Martinson Coffee, which I still enjoy, or rolling the dice on a package of K-cups from a source that I have not heard of previously.  For the most part I will err on the more unique experience

Incomplete Tasks

This weekend I had devoted to catch-up on a very long list.   I managed to get my overdue lab results from my doctor and acted on it.  Mercy Philadelphia Hospital has its first week of Computerized Physician Order Entry, known as CPOE, which occupied much of my work week to the neglect of anything else.  I had a few deadline items such as doing shacharit at AKSE and learning the third aliyah of next week's Torah portion, which I got done.  There was a semi-deadline for a blog contract with Medscape that I pretty much did as well.  And then we have the many things that have to get done or should get done but do not really have deadlines and sometimes not even end points.  This week I will have to update the hospital billing and change the system around to make the billing more timely.  The Department of Labor has sending me notices for a year even though I have not had employees during that time.  I finally took my fifty year old Schwinn out of the garage, put air in the tires and took it to Sports Authority for a safety and function inspection with the intent of riding it for exercise.  I can sit at my desk.  My new briefcase has sufficient content to transport things that I need to keep in my possession.  There is a menu for Mother's Day and I even got a card.  So it wasn't a total non-productive week or even weekend.

Just shy of two months remain in my semiannual intentions.  I may still be able to bring a cleaning crew in next month if I get the Family Room more accessible.  My monthly outings remain on schedule and I have some growth to the culinary herbs outside the front door and in the aerogarden.  I've done nothing of note financially. I've written nothing even close to submission for public consumption.  My research project remains largely neglected.  I'll try to plod along with these in the coming week.