Growing Greens in Winter

As a kid I didn’t like vegetables.  Few kids do but I think it was worse for my generation.  We came up in a time when food was aggressively being corporatized.  The memory of the quaint grocery store on the corner of my Dad’s childhood neighborhood is nearly overshadowed by the emergence of the modern grocery store, quite literally “super” markets.  In order to fill the rows and rows of shelves most everything in these supermarkets had to be processed and in those days, that meant canning.  

It’s better today but in those earlier times when they were ramping up production, little subtleties like quality, taste and aesthetics were casualties.  One taste of canned asparagus was enough to put me off of the odd little veggie for decades and don’t even get me talking about canned peas.  When you you can describe a food item as looking “like fat gangrenous ticks” there’s no amount of culinary artistry going to make them palatable.

Lettuce was about the only veggie I actually liked.  In contrast to canned vegetable mush, it was crisp, cool and refreshing.  Perhaps because I liked lettuce, early on I started looking to other types of greens as veggies I might like.  It took time but over the years I did find varieties and ways of preparing them that I liked.

The really cool thing about all the kales, turnips, chards, cresses is that with a little accommodation, many of them can be grown during the winter.  If I’ve learned anything in the last three years it’s that winter gardening with greens is where it’s at!  In terms of adding variety and nutrition to your diet with minimal effort, these plants make the enterprise a no brainer.

Winter accommodation of greens is a three pronged approach.  First you have to select types and varieties that will do well in your area.  Collards though winter hardy are less so than Kale which explains the regional preferences for them.  Second you have to start them early enough in good amended soils so that they’ll have good root systems and be well established before the cooler weather slows their growth.  Lastly you need to be prepared to protect them from extremes.  In my area, that mostly means having some loose mulch available to put over your plants if really cold weather threatens, I use wheat straw.  When cold weather threatens I simply throw some straw over the plants.  After the threat has passed you just pull the straw back off the plants and it serves as additional mulch.  In other areas you might need to throw an additional cover over them.  Floating row covers do maintain a few extra degrees under them.  A good strategy is to take them off during the day so that the sun can warm the soils and place the rows over them at sun set to minimize over night heat loss.  Plastic sheeting can be used the same way in more extreme conditions. 

To this I would add that you can also grow more tender greens like lettuce in the winter using cold frames.  Even a small frame can yield large returns.  We made ours with a few bales of straw laid out in a “U” shape that was open to the south to allow maximum exposure to the winter sun and protection against cold northerly winds.  If we expected freezing temps we simply pulled some plastic sheeting over the top.  Our small patch (~2’ X 6’) yielded several large salads a week without ever looking picked over.

This year I decided to do a test to see exactly how cold hardy the greens I was growing were by allowing them to remain fully exposed during a cold spell where we had temps dip to the low teens for several nights in a row.  Basically, I go these results:

• The curly kale acted like nothing ever happened.  We’ve eaten it since, both raw and cooked and it’s as good as ever.
• Collards initially wilted but came right back and look no worse for the wear.  I’ve yet to cook any to see if flavor was affected but generally speaking, people say cold weather improves their taste
• The Tuscan kale took a bit of a hit but largely came through unscathed.  I haven’t tried to cook any since but did pick and eat a raw piece and it seemed unaffected.
• Broccoli was a near total loss and showed some damage after the first night.  Ordinarily, this would be upsetting but a late season warm spell sent the plant I’d planted for a spring harvest into early production and we’d already harvested the largest part of the crop.
• Turnip greens were a complete loss.  Initially they looked like they were going to come through the cold snap but after a few warmer days they withered and died.

Though I did experience some losses during this experiment I did at least learn where to concentrate my efforts next winter.  All in all growing winter greens has proven very rewarding and provides a good nutritional return on the amount of time invested.

While greens are thought of as simple fair, they can be dressed up pretty easily.  Let some pepper flake, onion and pancetta sing in a bit of olive oil, add some roughly chopped fresh collards and use a little white wine as a brazing liquid and you’ve got something special.  Garnish them with a few pine nuts or golden raisins (or both) and you’ve got something extraordinary and if you’ve got a nice bottle of home made pepper vinegar to go on them, well that’s heaven.

The ACA Fire Fight

I was working late one Friday night trying to solve a problem for a client when my boss, an ex-marine came in.  I confided in him that I wasn’t sure I was doing the right thing but felt that waiting till Monday to address the issue was not the proper course even if it gave me more time to think my options through.  He agreed and told me about the rules of a fire fight.  He said that when you’re under attack the longer you wait to do something the fewer and less viable your options become.  His point was that sometimes any action, even one that’s not the best, is better than hesitation.  In his experience hesitation could mean the difference between life and death.

When people complain about the ACA I think of that ex-marine’s story.  Thing is, I always was and remain ambivalent about the ACA.  If functionally doesn’t solve any problems but its better than having just sat back and watched the existing system’s problems overwhelm and bankrupt it.  Thanks in part to the ACA, we can look forward to that same prospect in another 5 to 7 years.  If that sounds like a criticism it is but, those who pressed for reform and got the ACA through at least bought us time.  Those who continue to criticize the ACA and the effort behind it really don’t have much credibility in my book.  They didn't act when action was called for, there is no reason to believe they would have initiated their own effort and are still not offering counter solutions.  The singular truth that we all know is that the current healthcare system is not sustainable and reform is needed.  We need to stop pointing fingers and complaining about what happened during the last fire fight and get ready for the next because its surely coming.

Evolving Expectations

When I started this blog I had intended to blaze a trail to a more self sufficient existence by documenting my progress as a gardener.  What I found was that while my intentions were good my concept of what this entailed was flawed.  It was, at least, poorly understood.

Foremost, I mistook how much time it takes to maintain a focused and well disciplined blog.  Doing so takes time, dedication and a discipline to stay on topic and remain relevant to those who might follow you.  At this point in my life with two children at home and a career to grow, time is just in short supply.  That’s a reality not an excuse.  Furthermore, because I have so many other interests about which I’m passionate I've found it difficult to write within the narrow focus the blog’s original intent demands.  Not feeling able to write about what I want to at any given time wasn't conducive to publishing.

Secondarily I mistook the impact it takes on ones time to advance your level of self sufficiency in regards to food production.  It’s one thing to prep the ground and plant some seeds and care for the garden during its youth.  It’s another to tend it in the heat of the summer, stay on top of weeds and insect infestations not to mention find the time to harvest, process and store your hard won bounty for use throughout the year.  This might come as a surprise but weeds and bugs don’t wait for Saturdays and oddly enough, crops ripen with total disregard to what you have on your otherwise overfilled schedule.  If the corn is ready to pick and process the weekend of the soccer tournament…well you get the picture.  Factor in inclement weather, emergency family situations, unexpected household repairs, a little down time with family and friends (whom you already make too little time for) and you begin to think the garden isn't contributing to your life the way you thought it would, at least relative to the amount of time it demands of you.

This isn't to say that the effort was without its rewards.  My garden is a healthy place.  A place where packed dirt has given way to fertile soil.  Regardless of my not finding the time to maximize its food providing potential, its home for honey bees, toads and little brown snakes.  This year it also drew in the indigenous Carolina praying mantis (Stagmomantis Carolina) a beneficial insect I've never before observed.  I've seen garden spiders grow fat in the waning summer sun and watched finches wrestle among the corn tassels.  I've delighted at blue birds feeding their young and the adornment of plant stakes by the iridescence of the dragonflies that perch atop them.  It’s a place I've made better through the sweat of my brow.  If the garden fails to feed my body in proportion to the effort it demands, it certainly nourishes my spirit in abundance.

Because of my experiences in the garden I've also gaining a HUGE appreciation of the hard work and dedication of the farmers that to bring food to our tables.  I must say that as good as increasing self-sufficiency sounds I've come to think that, from a societal perspective, “supporting” sustainable agriculture should probably be a higher priority than growing heirloom tomatoes.  I know, you’re thinking “blasphemy” right?

So where am I going with all this.  Well I’m not exactly sure.  The garden is here to stay but my expectations of it are evolving.  It will certainly continue to be a classroom, a chapel and a home to birds, bees, toads and the occasional snake.  It will continue to provide food for my plate but, perhaps not for my freezer.  For that I’m leaning towards surrendering some of my time and resources towards finding and supporting those farmers who share my values and are looking to create a more sustainable food system.  By helping to grow the economic incentives for these effort it’s my hope that more families than just mine might benefit.

As for the blog, well I intend to keep it going too (or start it going as the case may be) but topically, it’s not going to be as focused as was originally intended.  My original vision was that I was a citizen who gardened, an average Joe trying to improve his own circumstances.  What I've come to appreciate over the last couple of years is that gardening has informed my citizenship.  As important as self sufficiency is, my life is also richer for it's interconnections with others.  In the future I hope to post on topics that reflect this.

Just Another Snake Story

Last Thursday I encountered 3 black rat snakes.  The first was a jet black animal I spotted crawling along the roots of a wind-felled tree.  He was safe but I stopped to take a closer look and say hello.

The second was a newly hatched baby crossing the road.  Baby black rat snakes are patterned in varying shades for grey.  At this age they are somewhat delicate creatures and I gently lifted it off the road and placed it safely off to the side.  It seemed to view my assistance as a non event and took its time disappearing into the cover where I'd placed it.  

The third snake was an attractively patterned 5 footer.  It was also crossing the road, but was less interested in my help.  The car in front of me had just passed over him and I thought he’d been hit as he was all coiled up and thrashing but he was fine; fine being a relative term.  Frankly, he was in mortal terror.  Out in the open with huge noisy metal objects hurtling over them is not a place such secretive animals enjoy.  I thought of the many snakes I’ve seen hacked to pieces and how the people who do the hacking usually described the snakes as vicious.  Such lack of empathy irritates me and I’ve often wondered what behavior they would manifest if I snatched the shovel from their hands and commenced chopping their body parts off.  But I digress.  

Being in a somewhat disturbed state of mind the snake didn't recognize that I was there to help and had several coils in the air and was  lunging at me whenever I got too close.  I noticed that when he struck he moved just a bit in my direction so I put myself between him and the side of the road.  I thought that by repeatedly moving close enough to elicit strikes I would be able to lead him closer to safety.  Ordinary I would have just grabbed him anyway but, I was going out in public and didn't want to do so having been bit, musked and crapped on, which scared snakes are want to do.  Besides this was a safe, open stretch of road so I opted for a method that would be gentler for both parties.  

I was making good progress when the first car stopped.  I didn’t know the guy but he was the characteristic idiot who looked at me with the disdain we herpers (people who like reptiles) get right before we’re “informed” we’d be better off just killing the damn thing.  Ignoring Cro-Magnon man, I kept on the process of leading the snake off the road when a second car stopped.  “What ya doing” the passenger asked?  When I told him I was helping the snake off the road he said, “That’s pretty cool.  Most people just kill them” and drove off leaving me to think that perhaps there’s hope for mankind after all.

The last car to stop was driven by a very old lady who watched intently as I led the snake to the side of the road were it finally bolted for cover and was gone.  When I turned around she had a light in her eye and said in a quivering old lady voice, “You remind me of my husband.  He “was” always helping snakes off the road so they wouldn’t get hurt.”  She then thanked me and with a huge smile drove off down the road.

Small acts of kindness give reward enough in just the doing.  This time however knowing that helping a terrified snake off the road also gave an this lady a warm memory of her late husband made for a special moment.  I found myself wishing I’d known the guy but content myself with knowing that many of my friends are probably a lot like him.

Long Time Coming

Citizen Gardener came into existence on a lark.   Its main purpose was to share the experience of moving towards a more sustainable and localized food system but it also served as an outlet for my writing which, despite the efforts of primary education English teachers, remains enjoyable.  Still, as important as the need for a new food paradigm is to me, I found that writing about it exclusively was too limiting, hence the lack of updates.  Moving forward Citizen Gardener will be open to address and discuss a broader range of topics though most will still be related to sustainability.  In the interim, I’d like to do a little bit of quick catching up on the gardening activities.

2010 was a banner year.  A Face Book photo album of the year’s events can be viewed here.  The garden was amazingly productive and provided the lion share of our seasonal vegetables.  I even like to boast that it provided all (or nearly so) of what my second granddaughter ate in her first year of life.  It was immensely satisfying to know that she was given such a good dietary start. 

A FB album of 2011 garden events can be viewed here.  In February of 2011 we lost my father-in-law Jimmy after a long struggle with heart disease.  He remains sorely missed.  Though the gardening season got off to a good start, settling Jimmy’s affairs and moving my mother-in-law in with us consumed so much time that gardening was necessarily put on the back burner.  Few things are ever a complete loss and the garden was no exception.  We still learned a lot and had a very successful winter season. 

2012 was perhaps the best year to date.  The highlights, so far, can be viewed here.  We started the year eating fresh greens almost daily.  If I learned one thing last winter and spring it would be that kale is the new broccoli.  Fresh and tender, it is an exceedingly versatile vegetable and I had no problem getting the kids to eat lots of it.  There were also new successes with early season crops.  This was the first year we grew onions, not just spring onions but actual bulbs you put in your pantry.  They went in a little late and therefore were a bit on the small side but we grew enough to meet our needs through the summer and we use a lot of onions!  2012 also turned out to be the year of the tomato as we finally saw a good crop.  I think the biggest element of that success was the use of disease resistant hybrid varieties.  I can hear the boos and hisses on that but I’m not committed to using hybrids.  I’d expand on this later; the hybrids v heirloom debate is enough for its own post.  As yet 2012 is not over and I’m just beginning to get the fall and winter crops put in.  Topical updates will be posted here at Citizen Gardener but specific events and pictures will continue to be uploaded to the FB albums so check back later.

Tomatoes

My grandfathers made it looks so easy. Vine ripe home grown tomatoes bursting with flavor and juiciness were so plentiful as a kid that I just took them for granted.

Truth be told I’ve grown tomatoes before without much hassle but since moving to coastal NC it’s been pretty hit and miss. This year I decided to do the necessary reading and research to determine what was so frequently going wrong. In the end I believe I’ve learned what I need too in order to have a reliable yield next year.

Perhaps my most important victory this year was to correctly identify the diseases that have been plaguing my tomatoes for several years. The first and worst of these is early blight. This is a nasty little soil fungus that tends to accumulate in gardens that routinely grow tomatoes. There is no such thing as blight resistant plant, which was my first mistake. When you see varieties listed as resistant this is generally referring to the various forms of wilt but more on that latter.

The prime natural controls for early blight are crop rotation and removal of diseased material from the garden. A good rotation of crops deprived the blight organism of a host and so it becomes attenuated in the soil. I’m not sure you can ever be rid of this disease but if it only exists as a part of a balanced soil flora it’s less likely to cause significant damage to crops.

Prompt removal of diseased plants is critical in preventing further spread of the organism to neighboring plants. Equally important is removing tomato vines from the garden at the end of the season so they don’t serve to help the fungus overwinter. While it is easy to understand that you wouldn’t throw diseased plants into the compost pile, I’ve made it a practice not to put ANY tomato produces into the pile. As compose is spread throughout the garden doing so would defeat the positive effects of rotating my crops.

Plant spacing and moisture control are also important in controlling blight. Blight loves cool damp conditions so evening watering is not a good idea. Instead it’s advisable to water in the morning or early afternoon so that the foliage has time to dry before nightfall and the onset of cooler temperatures. Wider spacing of plants also facilitates adequate air flow around the plant to help the drying process. Keeping the plants staked and off the ground is another important method of control. Remember that blight is a soil dwelling fungus and whenever foliage has the opportunity to contact soil the chance of infection is increased. To this end some recommend trimming plant’s lower branches to keep them off the ground and a good layer of mulch to prevent soil particles from splashing onto foliage when it rains.

This year I have very little issue with blight. Even though tomatoes had been grown in the same spot for the last two years, adequate, spacing, staking, pruning, mulching and timely irrigation seemed to control the disease quite well and no chemicals were needed.

The second disease I have in the garden affecting tomatoes is bacterial wilt. Wilts affect the plant’s roots and their ability to take up adequate moisture. Most of the time the vines will look healthy but during the heat of the day they wilt back because they can’t take in enough moisture. Generally the plants rebound as the day lengthens but such repeated stress on the plants makes them susceptible to other diseases and interferes with proper setting and formation of fruit.

Natural controls for wilt are rotation, spacing, soil preparation and selecting the proper variety. Rotation controls the wilt organism the same way as with blight while spacing and soil preparation allow for maximum root growth and moisture uptake. Variety selection is important in that some show resistance to the disease.

As this season approached I did some research and selected three varieties that were know for good resistance to bacterial wilt. The resistant varieties were selected for varying fruit characteristics and because they had indeterminate vines. Indeteminant plants grow and fruit throughout the season. With these three varieties I had hoped to produce a sustainable crop of varied fruits right up to the first frost. As it turns out, all three "varieties" were determinant plants which generally grow to a certain size, set fruit over a much shorter season and are done for the year. They are great when growing for the mass market or when you plan to preserve your crop but for fresh eating its feast then famine and our feast was largely over by the end of July!

The big lesson here however is not the difference between the two types of vines. The important aspect is but that you have to be careful who you buy your plants and or seed from! The three distinct varieties I planted all look and performed exactly the same. Vine characteristic being completely off alone is sufficient to support the conclusion that they were not the varieties I believed them to be. That the fruit the plants set was decidedly inferior is enough to tell that they were likely some form of uncontrolled hybrid. As always, I bought my plants this year from a respected garden center but it’s quite obvious that either the seed supplier had insufficient controls to propagate varietals or the garden center failed to track and label their inventory properly. To get around these unknown I’ve decided that next year we will be starting our tomatoes from seed purchased from the venerable Southern Seed Exchange. One can not take the initial input into a garden for granted if you want reliable and predicable results year after year.

The Essence

Just in time for planting warm season plants it looks like the weather will finally cooperate and allow me to work my plant beds. Actually, the weather cooperated last weekend but it was just too pretty to spend double digging the garden. Instead, I ended up
heading south with the family to visit the town of Bath NC and Goose Creek State Park in Washington County. The park was a real hit for the kids who swam in the shallow, tea colored waters of the Pamlico Sound, looked for fossils along the trails and chased lizards across fallen logs. Needless to say they had a blast exploring and having some dedicated time with Mom and Dad. Gardening is great but life requires balance and this proved a very restorative day trip. But I digress...

Since my last post, I've selected the location and size (30 X 45 feet)of the garden expansion but a few issues relating to its placement have ruined my motivation to have it ready for a summer planting. Number one is that the chosen site has been heavily "utilized" by my 100 lb "house dog". I could paint a nice verbal narrative on the problem but will spare you the details. Anyway, because of this I've decided to let the expansion area go fallow for the summer. I'm fencing the plot to exclude the dog and planting it with a warm season cover crop. This should allow for attenuation of dog nasties and in late summer, prior to prepping it for fall and winter crops, I'll cover the area with black plastic to cook off the rest.

The other issue with the selected area is that it is wind swept by frequent northeasterns. To mitigate this I'm planting two parallel rows of bushes along the north border to block the brunt of these damaging winds. For this I've successfully rooted three cuttings from an amazingly wind hardy blueberry bush in my neighbor's yard which will be mixed in with two other cultivars from a local grower to ensure adequate cross-pollination. The other row will be grapes. I lean towards putting in native vines as they are completely trouble free but I already have an arbor of scuppernongs in the front yard. Some have suggested wine grapes (V. vinifera). I'm not adverse to the idea but I need to find out how much chemical support they require. I'm hoping that a small isolated arbor can be supported organically so I'm continuing research on my alternatives. In any case, I doubt that either of these fruiting "hedges" will provide much in the way of a wind shield for a couple of years so I'm planning to use alternating rows of rye grass to block late spring and early summer winds for the next year or two.

Perhaps I'm just deluding myself but this "delay" is really not keeping me from reaching my objectives. I've mentioned before that our food choices have tremendous implications from their impacts on our health to our dependence of foreign oil but somewhere in the middle is their influence on our communities. As a citizen gardener I don't want to produce all my own vegetables just those that I reasonably can. For the balance, I plan to rely on other local producers, be they other back yard enthusiasts or commercial growers. In other words besides growing vegetables I need to grow support for the types of land use I want to see in my community. In my mind, developing such relationships, seems to be the essence of becoming a citizen gardener.