448.98 pounds of veggies from 200 square feet of growing area. Worth over $600 using conventional pricing, so I definitely made back what it cost me to grow it (around $200? I have to check.) Not too shabby. Last year’s yield was a paltry 250 pounds. My goal this year was 50% more, or 375 pounds, which I exceeded by almost 75 pounds.
Some things didn’t do as well as I would have liked. I let the lettuce fizzle out when summer rolled around and never got back to it. Ditto for the radishes. I never even picked the chard, which was decimated by sun and bugs. Less than 6 pounds of red bell peppers. Less than 10 pounds of potatoes. And the tomatoes, only 40 pounds? Yeesh.
I was happy with the yield of the cabbage, zucchini, sweet potatoes and cucumbers.
The onion yield was good, but it only lasted about 6 months. I could use twice that. And it wasn’t a good storage variety, so I had to chop them up and throw them in the freezer.
So I know what I need to work on for 2022. Basically, I want more of everything.
After the final harvest from Bed #4, I took some soil samples. It’s been three years, I think, since the soil was professionally tested. In the spring this particular bed was planted with broccoli, and in the summer it was planted with corn and butternut squash. All heavy feeders. I’m expecting the soil to be completely depleted.
Ten days after mailing I got the test results from Rutger’s and, SURPRISE! The results weren’t what I expected at all. Take a look…
Soil Test Results, Fall 2021, Bed #4
The nutrient profile was surprisingly good. I wish I could say that regular compost applications alone had accomplished this, but I cannot. I did use some commercial organic fertilizer this year, at the beginning and midpoint of the season. So some of this might be due to that. Considering how high the numbers are, though, I probably didn’t need it. Compost alone might have been enough. Only one way to find out. I’m going to garden without the expensive store bought stuff next year.
With one exception. The pH is a little low, so I will follow the recommendations and add some lime.
I’ve often wondered if I could just bury my kitchen scraps in the garden bed instead of tossing them in the compost pile and waiting eight months for them to turn into fertilizer. Would that boost the fertility of the soil quickly, or create an underground environment that hindered root development?
I read through all my gardening books, and while they all heartily recommend composting, none say anything on the subject of direct burial. In theory, it would have to work, after all, it’s basically the premise of keyhole gardening. You toss your kitchen waste in a designated spot in the garden, the worms come and eat it, and leave their castings behind as they travel, enriching the soil.
So I turned to the internet, where there was a surprising amount of information on the subject. After reading a bit, the general consensus seems to be that bypassing the middleman is probably ok as long as you keep three things in mind:
Chop the scraps into small pieces before burying. Better yet, run them through the food processor or blender. That way, a narrow trench can be dug, and the resulting slurry (sounds yummy, right?) can be poured into the trench and easily covered over. The small pieces will also decompose faster.
Don’t overwhelm the planting area with buried scraps.
Give the scraps in the trenches time to decompose before planting near them.
I decided to just go ahead and do it.
Since Bed #4 was essentially done for the year I started there. Between September 26 and October 15 I buried three gallon-size bags of kitchen scraps: old lettuce, onion skins, coffee grounds, banana peels, overripe tomatoes, eggshells, forgotten clementines and some very squishy grapes.
Bypassing the compost pile
As you can see, I already broke rule #1. The pieces are chunkier than they should be, but I was in a hurry, and besides, nothing is going to be planted in this bed for four or five months, so they have plenty of time to break down.
I figure I’ll work my way around the garden like this, burying three gallon-size bags of scraps in each bed. Around the end of December I’ll check to see how the decomposition is progressing. If all is going well, I might have time for one more round before spring planting.
With the help of three little tomatoes and several not-so-little squash we surpassed our goal of harvesting 375 pounds of veggies from the garden this year! As of October 15 our total is 377.55 pounds – and there’s still more to pick, like sweet potatoes, broccoli, cabbage, chard, bell and poblano peppers, butternut squash, and even a few carrots.
We’ll wait till everything is harvested before we set next year’s goal.
I couldn’t wait any longer. I think they were ready, anyway. I picked seven. If you look closely there’s another one growing in the back of the bed in the center. He’s still green so I have to leave him there for a few weeks.
A week before I picked them I discovered a nest, in the ground, large enough to compromise the integrity of two of my four plants. I don’t know what kind of animal it was, but the nest was about eight inches deep, full of fur, and invisible until the plants started to die back in September. I hope the babies were ready to leave when their cover was blown.
Next year I’m going to grow my butternut squash on a fence or trellis to open up some garden space.
Variety: Waldo PMR F1 by Johnny’s Selected Seeds. Four plants, direct seeded in the garden, the first week of June. Harvested September 21. Yield to date: 14.13 pounds (there’s still one more out there)
This poor Brown Turkey Fig has had a hard life. I had the best intentions when I bought it. I planted it in a good size pot with good quality potting soil. After that, things kinda went downhill, not intentionally, of course. One year it got stuck in a corner of the yard with no sun. The next year it was brought out of its winter hiding place too soon, and nearly froze to death. Then it was left too close to a flaming fire pit, whereupon all its leaves turned brown and crispy and fell off. When removing the damaged branches, I’m afraid I may have been a bit heavy-handed with the pruning shears. It’s a wonder it’s alive at all.
When I bought it, it was a nice little tree, so I’m going to clone it. I took a few cuttings on September 6th. It might not have been the right time of the year to take cuttings, but I did it anyway. In a few months (when I think it will be the right time of the year to take cuttings) I will take more cuttings. Hopefully a few of these will survive, because I would love to have a fig tree or two in my yard.
Update 10-11-21: We have roots!
This is only one of the three cuttings I took a month ago. Hopefully the other two look just as good. Now I have to put them in bigger and better pots and figure out how to overwinter them. I’m thinking a protected area outside augmented by plastic, burlap and mulch should do the trick. I’m also going to take a few more cuttings, just in case.
This plant is amazing. As of September 30, I’ve harvested 48.36 pounds this year – from two plants that only take up two square feet of garden space.
As you can see from the photos below, there’s a lot more squash in my future.
It may not be suitable for all gardens, but if you have a fence for it to run on, it’s definitely worth the space. Last year I stopped picking them sometime in September so the fruits that were on the vine could ripen into winter squash. I didn’t think the winter version was as good as a butternut squash, so I’m not doing that this year. This year I’m going to keep picking as long as they’re producing.
I might, however, need more seeds. The ones I have are at least two years old. It might be prudent to let one fruit ripen enough to produce viable seeds so I know I’m set for next year.
