Goal for 2022: 500 pounds of veggies from my little garden!
It weighed more than three pounds and took over two hours to cook. You don’t often see sweet potatoes like this in the store. With good reason. If “you eat with your eyes first” this one’s an appetite annihilator.
It was good though. Very sweet.
So I wrote in my day planner that I needed to go to Whole Foods to get a few organic sweet potatoes so I could grow my own slips this year.
I had forgotten that I already had plenty.
And some were already sprouting!
Let’s hope what’s growing underground is equally impressive!
And it is!
57.75 pounds of sweet potatoes.
Not too shabby!
So Bed #5 was only supposed to be occupied by sweet potatoes and pole beans this summer, but it was called upon during the onion emergency to support and sustain the extras that didn’t fit in Bed #2. And it did an admirable job. But now things are getting a little crowded. I’m going to pull these onions soon, like by dinnertime, even though they’re not fully mature. My husband wants french onion soup, and it seems silly to go out and buy the main ingredient when I have 150 or so of them in my yard. Besides, the sweet potatoes need room to grow.
I also put some of the extra onions in Bed #6, the salad bed. If I had ever doubted the importance of full sun in onion growing, I don’t anymore. Bed #6 gets part sun, at best, and the onions grown there were puny.
The onion on the right, after removing the leaves and roots, weighed in at nine ounces, while the onions on the left, untrimmed, barely registered on the scale. The salad bed, while suitable for leafy greens that like a little afternoon shade, is no place for onions.
So in order to reach my goal of producing 375 pounds of vegetables from my little garden patch, I have to make the most of every inch for every minute of the gardening season. That means planting and replanting as the seasons change. But what if the old plants aren’t harvest-ready when it’s time to replant with the new?
Case in point: Bed #1. According to my plan, the spring planting of Quickstar kohlrabi should be ready to harvest by May 1, and the spring planting of Ferry’s Round Dutch cabbage should be ready by May 21. That leaves the bed open for the tomatoes and eggplant which will occupy it through the fall.
It’s May 9. The kohlrabi can be picked anytime now. The cabbage, however, is nowhere near ready, and will probably need another month. The tomatoes can’t wait that long.
If I harvest the kohlrabi and weed real well, I’ll be able to see how much space I have to work with. If there was room, I could plant the tomatoes amongst the cabbage. It would only be for a month.
Apparently that’s a no-no. Most gardening sites agree on the inadvisability of planting nightshades and brassicas together.
Bed #3 is another problem. The sugar snap peas, carrots and beets are nowhere near ready and the sweet potato slips are here and need to be planted. Now, if I remember correctly, it took the sweet potatoes a while to get going last year. However, the carrots, peas and beets probably need another 4 weeks. The sweet potatoes could be enormous by then! I’m afraid they’re going to completely overwhelm the spring stuff. I’ll keep an eye on the vines and cut them back if I have to. I’m also going to plant some in Bed #3 and some in Bed #5 so nothing’s too crowded.
I don’t know why this is happening, I mean, I can add, after all. Which is all that’s required. Days to germination plus days to maturity equals days to harvest. I should have added in a few days (weeks?) to account for the unexpected. Like a very (very!) cold, wet spring, and covid-corrupted shipping schedules. Not complaining though! I’m happy and healthy and planting sweet potatoes! Life is good.