Waiting For Spring to Arrive

I write this a few days before March begins yet there is certainly no hint of spring on the horizon here in Saco, Maine.  The pictures below were taken today, February 26th, a day after the latest snow storm brought six or so inches of heavy, wet snow to Saco. Another storm may happen tomorrow and even if some days next week reach the 40 degree range as predicted, the nights will continue to be below 32 degrees. This winter has not set any records for total snowfall but these pictures show as big of piles of snow as I have seen in my eight winters here.  The diference this year has been the fact that there has almost been weekly snowstorms since Christmas and the weather has stayed cold so melting between storms has rarely occured.  I certainly hope the spring, when it finally arrives doesn't bring a steady deluge of rainstorms and flooding!

No serious garden planning has occurred yet even though the seed catalogues continue to arrive in the mail. I have tallied my seeds on hand so I can soon place an order though. The greenhouse is set up in the basement for some indoor planting that should get started in early March.

The wood pile is rapidly shrinking as the wood stove continues to have a voracious appetite for logs. I certainly will go thought the three cords I had split, cut and stacked for this heating season. If there is some decent snow melting in early March I may be cutting more wood for this season in addition to beginning the process of working on the stockpile for the winter of 2011-2012.  Ideally the following winter's wood piles are prepared in the spring and neatly stacked and covered to dry over the long summer and fall months.

There really hasn't been much to report on since my last posting in December. The Christmas gathering of the family was fun and festive as always. I have made two more New York trips for Cotton babysitting duties, or as he would say, "I am not a baby, I am a boy."  I have endured two long, lingering winter colds, read a lot and made a lot of soups and crock pot stews. Much time has been spent planning for the big news here on the homestead this coming spring, namely a complete makeover of the kitchen. Cooking, canning, freezing and endless food preparation of the harvest has been challenging in my current kitchen. Soon a wall comes down to open it up to sunlight from the south facing deck glass doors, to allow the warmth of the wood burning stove to better reach the kitchen and to have a big island and lots of counters to handling all the work needed for my Schlaver Seed Farms operations.  The new cabinets are now being made and the actual construction on site will begin in late April. I bet I will do a mid to late May posting on this blog of the results!

The Garden is done for 2010

Everything has now been harvested for this gardening season except a few leeks that have now been mulched and can be pulled as needed. There aren't enough left to worry about beyond the holiday season but certainly enough for some good pots of potato-leek soup!  The garden beds are mulched with chopped leaves or straw for the winter. The strawberry and asparagus deserve the special straw treatment.

It was quite a garden year in 2010...the best ever. The larder is full with canned, frozen, dried or fresh stored items in a cool corner of the basement.  It was a bit tramatic for me to now visit the supermarket produce department and not just smile and only buy bananas as was the case since July. If I want lettuce, cucumbers or tomatoes I need to buy them now. The seed catalogues are arriving for my winter enjoyment but I am not thinking about or planning for the next season yet.

I am due for some down time finally and some resting for my weary bones after many vigorous months of garden and yard labors. The only outdoor work now involves carring wood to the house for the wood stove and some cutting and splitting of logs and branches already gathered this year in anticipation of next winter's use. I need about three cords of wood each year for my stove and would like to have most of next winter's wood all cut, split and stacked for seasoning now before a lot of snow falls. I do have most of that amount in various piles awaiting that processing. It is sure satisfying to see the small amount of oil added to the tank each time the truck arrives each month, for the price is steadily jumping with each delivery. I end up saving nearly $1,000 per year by using my own wood. I manage to gather the wood for no cost from my neighbor's acerage or other opportunities that present themselves. So the only cost for wood gathering is a lot of sweat labor.

After a great trip to NewYork and Richmond VA for Thanksgiving I now look forward to playing host for Christmas here for my family. The tree is up and will be decorated this weekend. Some friends have decided to purchase many jars of my canned goods this year for some of their gift giving. I also had a few sucessful public sales events thorugh my social groups at Union Church and the Saco Bay Garden Club so can report a good year of sales as well. I made a donation of a portion of my sales to the local food bank and am kept busy with my envolvement with the Mission Committee of Union Church that does a lot of great charitable work on the local as well as international level. I am now the treasurer of the Garden Club so have some new duties with that organization as well There is plenty of jam, salsa, pickles and tomato sauce though to get me through the long winter and spring.

The winter will not be boring for me at all with my local activities and much desired down time to rest, read and enjoy the fruits of my harvest. I now want to send my best wishes to all my blog readers that their holiday season and winter months are also filled with rest, good company and hopeful thoughts for the new year.

The Last Rose of Summer.

The last rose of summer is now blooming. The main colors left on the farm are the fall colors of leaves and some berries as on the bittersweet vines that are plentiful around here and fun to use as decoration by the front door as well as inside the house.  The ordeal of gathering all the leaves, mulching them for compost, adding a winter cover for garden beds and the mulching of perennials is a major annual task but now about done.  We have had some windy rain storms the last few weeks and it has hastened the fall of leaves.   At this point I can report that most of the garden chores are now done, everything needing a protective cover for winter has it now, especially the strawberry and asparagus beds.

My final tally of canned products has hit 400 jars!  Nearly one third has been sold and the shelves in the basement are buldging with the rest. I have my wood stash for the winter all covered and in place in a few accessible locations and the snow blower is now in position in the garage. I am ready! A few veggies are still in the garden: Brussels sprouts; leeks; kale; some carrots; Swiss chard and turnip greens.

I want to share a fun video with you, faithful readers of the blog. In late October Cotton and his parents visited and he had a chance to help make apple cider in the old cider press and also enjoy the Saco Fall Festival downtown.  I think the video speaks for itself as to how much fun Cotton had as well as his parents and I. Enjoy!   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fFPCpSOA9Q

Apple Cider Making and Other Fall Activities

 The harvest continues on well into the month of October.  No killing frost has occurred yet so I can still pick flowers, harvest lettuce, herbs, tomatoes and other crops that the frost could harm. I have harvested all my potatoes and am thrilled with the sweet potato crop especially.

My neighbor, Paul B. has lent me his antique family apple press and in these photos is assisting me in the old fashion fall ritual of turning dropped apples into fresh cider. In this first session the yield for three hours of work on a Sunday afternoon was five gallons of cider. We have since done it again and ended up with six gallons!  Some of it has been processed in the canner and now there are twenty-two quarts of cider on the shelves along with the other jars of things. The fresh cider can last nearly three weeks though and is delicious. I am sure the compost pile will benefit from the mash left after the pressing and bees love it  too.


                           

It is definitely fall now and the nights are cool even if no serious frost yet. The wood stove is in use each night and a wood pile has been stacked on the deck for easy access.

I recently noticed many, many small asparagus shoots growing the the garden paths surrounding the original asparagus bed in the Raised Bed Garden and decided to make a new bed in the Field Garden from them.  To my great surprise I suddenly had 110 new plants to contend with! I made a new bed but could only use about 70 of the plants so am trying to find a home for the remaining plants. 

The harvested items on the front porch give you a sampling of the bounty this year. I am still serving any dinner guests many fresh salads, cooked veggies and fresh fruit as well as enjoying it all myself.  The canning jar total now stands at 370 with the addition of the apple cider and also the first batches of canned pear halves and pear jam from the pear tree. Pears take a few weeks to complete the ripening process after picking so there is more canning action to come.  The pear tree is the first of the six dwarf fruit trees to produce a crop.   I also plan to use some of the nicest dropped apples to make some apple butter. I make it in my crock pot and cook it all night.  (All the apples I used for the cider and will use for apple butter come from the neighbor's old apple trees as my apple trees have not produced a crop yet.)      
I am sure I will set a record of over 400 jars of items this spectacular gardening year. I have done well selling some of it to Union Church friends and Saco Bay Garden Club members in addition to giving many jars to family and friends. I look forward to the trips to the basement all winter long to grab a jar of jam, salsa, pickles, juice and pasta sauce.

The only other fall planting to be done is the mid-October planting of garlic.  The task was accomplished yesterday and I put in 187 individual cloves of the stuff. I decided to increase my annual supply. My yield for this year was 116 heads of garlic. Since it was such a productive year of canning of salsa, a lot of garlic was used in that process. This led my to determine I needed a bigger yield in the future, hence the increased planting for 2011.

 There are still the following crops in the ground and are safe from cold weather harm: Brussels sprouts; carrots; beets; Swiss chard, and turnips. My  tomatoes are all but done finally and I could harvest more tomatillos but really can't use them all. I even have some nice Indian corn for decorative use and have been adding the corn stalks to my lamp posts for a fall display. When the frost finally hits I will start digging the gladiola and dahlia tubers for winter storage in the basement. I am now starting to take in the various benches, deck furniture and garden decorations for the winter.

My only pet, a female rabbit that was named Clarence before her sex was determine, has moved from her outdoor rabbit hutch to her winter quarters inside. This image shows her via the web camera. If you go to this web location you may be able to watch her in real time during the daylight hours. I occasionally have the camera on the Field Garden view though, instead of turned toward her hutch:  http://saco.schlaver.com:90/javaimage.html

It's October and I am still Harvesting Daily!

 The weather is holding nicely…cooler and some rain but no frost. I may be able to harvest some late peas,turnips, snow peas and radishes that were planted in hopes of a fall crop. My fall crop of green beans produced nicely. There are still tomatoes in the garden and I am cooking everything RED imaginable: chili, pasta sauce, soups and stew with tomatoes in them…and still canning tomato-based products.

The sweet corn was a big success and just harvested in September. Soon I will have decorative Indian corn as well. Acorn squash was the success story in the squash family and I have about two dozen in storage. The leeks are huge and I am due to start using them. They join Brussels sprouts and kale as the frost safe crops so there is no harvest pressure for them.

Anyone visiting me these days leaves with a bouquet of gladiolas and or dahlias as well as tomatoes, tomatillos, Swiss chard and yes, some of the endless zucchini crop! Many green peppers, various hot peppers, okra and eggplant are still growing and are part of the daily harvest as well.

Sales have begun of some of my canned goods, namely various jams, pickles and salsa. I look forward to more sales in October and some customers plan to buy extra for gifts for family and friends for the holidays. After all I have over 300 jars of products so can easily sell off many of them.

My crop of dried beans is now all “shucked” for storage: pinto, cannellini and kidney beans as one of the pictures show. I still have to finish digging the potatoes and pulling the onions and am very curious about the size of the sweet potatoes remaining underground. All should be harvested in the next week or so.

Harvest Time Is In Full Swing -- and Fall Approaches

The bounty from a good garden season continues to pour into the house from the garden. The tomatoes and tomatillos have triggered the production of now over 100 jars of salsa. I am turning tomatoes into others things as well, namely, pasta sauce, BBQ sauce, hot sauce and just plain canned tomatoes.  There doesn't seem to be any end in site either to the basketfulls of the red things every other day.

The canning jar tally is now at 300 and climbing from there. I have put the word out to my Maine friends and church or garden club colleagues that jars of goodies are now for sale. I am hoping many jars are sold and the money can help fund the garden needs for next year.  I still have more potatoes and onions to dig and as the photo of the leeks show, it is time to make some potato-leek soup.

My gladolias and dahlias are now showing wonderful blooms all over the Raised Bed Garden and the black eyed Susans, sedum and other late summer-fall flowers are in full display. I am still cutting the acreages of grass but not as often now. The nights are cool for sleeping and the days rarely bring sweat producing heat.  Unfortunately I seem to spend most of my time in the kitchen except when it is time to pick more tomatoes, peppers, tomatillos, and greens for dinner. If I was a vegetarian I might not visit the grocery store at all!

August in Maine!

Where do I begin...the Garden Blog has been long silent due to some computer issues here at the Schlaver Seed Farm. Those problems are now over, thanks to son, Benjamin, so now I can catch up and give a report on the 2nd half of the incredible summer in Saco. This is my eight summer in Maine and the weather this year has been the absolute best of them all...even if the rainfall has been less than what might be needed for the garden.  We have had endless sun and warmth, cool nights for sleeping, far fewer mosquitoes than usual and the tomatoes are thriving!

I continue to fight a losing battle with weeds in the fairly new Field Garden. I am seriously conidering an investment in a large amount of black plastic for next year. I can anchor that on the beds, add slits and holes for the seedlings and plants and hopefully better manage the weeds as a result. The onion and potato crop has yielded a stunted, in size, harvest because of the weeds stealing the water and nutrients from the crops. This has also been the case with other veggies like the cucumbers and corn.  Yet I am pleased with what I have been able to harvest so far.  The tomato crop is mammonth and so is the tomatillo yield as well as various varieties of hot peppers so that means lots of SALSA!

Anyone that has been sitting at my dinner table this summer has enjoyed an abundance of lettuse, beets, cooked greens, beans, potatoes, zucchini, and incredible amounts of fruit like strawberries, blueberries, blackberries and peaches. The freezer is filled with bags of fruit that was first frozen on cookie sheets to keep the individual pieces separated and then put into plastic bags.

As the pictures below show, I am in full canning mode now and have been for several weeks. The tally of jars is now close to 200. The first effort is always jam: strawberry-rhubarb; strawberry; blueberry; blackberry and peach.  Later will come the apple butter. Pickles begin next and so far I have done: bread and butter pickles; sweet pickle spears; dill pickles and even zucchini spears. I have a crock full of whole dills that are brinning away for a month or so before going into the canning jars.  I have made four batches of red salsa and a couple batches of green salsa and there will certainly be more of both to come. Several jars of pasta sauce are put up already and more is expected. The main variety of tomato I choose to grow is the pear shaped San Marzano, a meaty variety perfect for sauce and salsa. One batch of "eggplant Madras" is completed for a special tasty treat.

As per usual I am able to pick my neighbor Midge's bountiful peach tree of all its fruit and this year that meant a lot of work over a couple days as they all seemed to ripen at once. So jam, pies, canned peach halves, some baked desserts and a lot of peaches eaten right off the tree resulted.

A very special event happened this August. I was given the honor of spending a full week alone with my grandson, Cotton.  This was his first time away from both his parents at the same time and he passed the test with flying colors. Fortunately he is so used to the Schlaver Seed Farm that it was like his home away from home in Brooklyn. We had a great time together digging potatoes, watching spider webs, picking Japanese beetles off the grape arbor, and eating blueberries and blackberries right off their bushes.  He loves his sandbox and all trucks and toys here and kept very busy. Of course, preferred that I, "Pops," was right there playing with him. To cap off a fun week for this almost three year old, we took the Downeaster train to Boston and then after a subway switch from North Station to South Station, boarded the Amtrak train for New York City.  He was thrilled to see his folks again but enjoyed his first of many trips, I presume, for a "summer camp" adventure in Saco.